{"id":366658,"date":"2025-08-23T07:22:15","date_gmt":"2025-08-23T07:22:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/366658\/"},"modified":"2025-08-23T07:22:15","modified_gmt":"2025-08-23T07:22:15","slug":"beaches-shut-as-venomous-blue-dragon-sea-slugs-surge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/366658\/","title":{"rendered":"Beaches Shut as Venomous \u2018Blue Dragon\u2019 Sea Slugs Surge"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph\">Dangerous sea slugs have forced the closure of a popular stretch of coast following multiple sightings of the pair of alien-like creatures, which can \u201cburn\u201d human skin. Swimming has been banned across Guardamar del Segura, on the Costa Blanca in southeastern Spain. Local police say, \u201cDue to the massive appearance of the Blue Dragon (Glaucus atlanticus), and for citizen safety reasons, SWIMMING is PROHIBITED on all beaches of the municipality until further notice.\u201d Informally known as the blue dragon because of their likeness to the fantasy creature, they measure around 1.2 inches long. \u201cContact with this sea animal can be dangerous and cause painful burns on the skin,\u201d police said. According to <a onclick=\"_sendArticleBodyInlineLinkClickAnalytics(&#039;https:\/\/edition.cnn.com\/2025\/08\/22\/travel\/spanish-beaches-shut-venomous-sea-slugs-intl-scli&#039;)\" href=\"https:\/\/edition.cnn.com\/2025\/08\/22\/travel\/spanish-beaches-shut-venomous-sea-slugs-intl-scli\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/edition.cnn.com\/2025\/08\/22\/travel\/spanish-beaches-shut-venomous-sea-slugs-intl-scli\">CNN<\/a>, they feed on other venomous creatures, using their own poison to put creatures even 300 times their size at risk of paralysis. Tourists have also been warned to adhere to the notice. Polic\u00eda Local Guardamar added, \u201cWe urge neighbors and visitors to respect the directions, exercise caution, and avoid direct contact with specimens that may appear in the sand.\u201d <\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"Sea slugs known as blue dragons can cause burning to humans\" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/4XSETSWOI5EUNOVMYJ7FVKF5W4.jpg\"  width=\"800\" height=\"1000\"\/>Cops put out a warning poster along with their statement  Polic\u00eda Local Guardamar <a class=\"read-it-at-btn\" href=\"https:\/\/edition.cnn.com\/2025\/08\/22\/travel\/spanish-beaches-shut-venomous-sea-slugs-intl-scli\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Read it at CNN Travel<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dangerous sea slugs have forced the closure of a popular stretch of coast following multiple sightings of the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":366659,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3847],"tags":[1425,299,16007,70,104,16,15,1717],"class_list":{"0":"post-366658","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-beach","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-ocean","11":"tag-science","12":"tag-spain","13":"tag-uk","14":"tag-united-kingdom","15":"tag-wildlife"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115076880570389327","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366658","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=366658"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366658\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/366659"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=366658"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=366658"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=366658"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}