10 Beautiful Marine Organisms That Just Don't Get Enough Love

Sponges are like the ocean's forgotten step child. They provide many of the same benefits that corals do, but get none of the glory. They filter large quantities of sea water, regulating the water chemistry. They also serve as habitat for fish and invertebrates, similar to corals.

AND you can bathe with them. How beautiful is that?

Yes, bivalves such as clams, scallops, mussels and oysters are delicious and provide big bucks to coastal economies. But did you know they also help keep our oceans healthy? (Except for the invasives, of course). Here's video proof! Most bivalves clean the water by filter feeding . A little ol' clam can filter 4.5 gallons of seawater per day--a single oyster can filter as much as 50 gallons a day! Oyster reefs also provide habitat for many marine organisms.

Being microscopic might be one reason these guys are not targeted by nature photographers, but several species of these tiny life forms are helping clean up the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and we think that is worth more than a pretty picture.

Yep, we're going to the bottom of the food chain on this one. The true underdogs. Plankton is a blanket term for microscopic plants (phytoplankton) and animals (zooplankton). Plankton play an important role in the ocean's food web. Photosynthesis by phytoplankton accounts for almost half of global primary production. Just in case you didn't know--almost all life on Earth relies directly or indirectly on primary production. So yeah, they're pretty important.

Plankton are also key indicators of things such as climate change. Learn more about how amazing plankton are: PLANKTON: Why are they important?

Horseshoe crabs are beautiful because they literally save millions of human lives. The crab's bright blue blood is used to test medical equipment and vaccines before they are used on people, preventing deaths caused by bacterial infection.

Ladies and gentlemen--the janitors of the sea. Cleaner wrasses are the most well-known of cleaner fish in the ocean. They set up "cleaning stations" in their habitats and groom larger predatory fish, feeding on dead tissue, scales and parasites. In fact, "the overall health, size, and even diversity of fishes is greater in the reefs where cleaner wrasses are found versus those without their services," according to reefbuilders.com.

Poor plants. They're always too busy providing shelter to fish to get wrapped up in the frenzy of the press. Plant habitats not only stabilize our shorelines and help prevent erosion, they also provide homes for so many marine organisms. Oh, and they help filter pollutants helping to increase the clarity of the water we flock to every summer. So beautiful.

What makes a sea cucumber absolutely stunning? Its poop! Yes, you read that right. Research shows that sea cucumber poop buffers against ocean acidification on coral reefs. They also eat the poop of other marine organisms and process It into useful nutrients! Whoa.