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Granny was the affectionate name eventually given to a beadlet sea anemone, Actinia equina, which in 1828 was taken from a rocky shore at North Berwick in Scotland by an amateur naturalist, John Dalyell.
During her long life through the Victorian era, she was cared for by a series of Edinburgh naturalists. Long outliving Dalyell, this sea anemone lived alone in a jar where she gave birth to several hundred offspring before her death in 1887.
Dalyell investigated and was puzzled by how Granny was producing her young, and, even in the 21st century, the processes involved are not well understood by zoologists.
Granny was shown to many visitors, some very distinguished, and her visitors' book held over a thousand names. She was the topic of several talks at scientific conferences, where she sometimes accompanied the speaker. Two educational children's stories were written about her in the didactic style typical of the era.
She became well known during her lifetime, becoming arguably the most famous and celebrated cnidarian of all time.
This specimen of an Actinia equina sea anemone was found on the shore at North Berwick in 1828 by the lawyer, antiquarian and naturalist John Graham Dalyell.
Dalyell, who collected sea creatures, thought it appeared to be about seven years old when he came across it. Beadlets are commonly found on rocky north-east Atlantic coasts.
Eventually in 1848 Dalyell, who by this time had been knighted and had inherited a baronetcy, described and illustrated it, calling it Actinia mesembryanthemum, in his two-volume book Rare and Remarkable Animals of Scotland, represented from Living Subjects, which concentrated on sessile marine creatures. He did not name the creature, simply referring to it as the specimen of Plate XLV.
The beadlet was reddish-brown when it was first taken but twenty years later it had become a dull greenish colour with blue tubercules at the base of the outer row of tentacles. There were three rows of tentacles with the fewest and longest in the inner row. Over time the number of tentacles increased, reaching 100 after 20 years.
In 1860 it was described as being pale brown in colour and no larger than a half-crown piece.
After Dalyell's death in 1851 the creature was cared for by Rev Prof John Fleming, followed by Dr James M'Bain, and latterly by John Sadler and then Robert Lindsay, both curators of the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh.
Although Dalyell described the species as hermaphrodite, the particular specimen that became famous was generally regarded as female because she produced offspring. It was not understood at the time that beadlet sea anemones can be of female, hermaphrodite or male morphological types, sometimes changing at different stages of their lives, and all states can produce young. Despite this, there is no consistent evidence of sexual reproduction in Actinia equina. In any case, after she had been caught Granny lived alone in a cylindrical glass jar, apart from brief periods with her newly born offspring. Under Dalyell's care she produced 334 young in 23 years and then none until 1857 when 240 offspring were born in one night.
Next, in 1872, there were 30 born in August and 9 more in December. After that, although she produced young in most years, the numbers declined.
Although he was mystified how the embryos were being produced, Dalyell discovered that they developed for highly variable lengths of time in the gastrovascular cavity of the parent. Sometimes they moved temporarily into the parent's translucent tentacles where they could be more easily observed and they might also leave the parent's body cavity and return later. Ultimately, in a rare and brief event that was very difficult to observe, they were ejected individually or en masse out of the parent's internal cavity, in much the same way as for disgorging indigestible food matter.
It was often said that Dalyell changed the sea water in the beadlet's jar every day and had his porter fetch new water from the sea at least three times a week but Dalyell's sister said that the water, which was carried in a 14 to 18 litres earthenware jug, might often be changed twice a day. Later, M'Bain fed Granny on half a mussel once a month whereas Dalyell had supplied more frequent and varied meals.
In 1861, John Harper wrote about her in detail, calling her by the name of Granny, and in 1866 Adam White produced a didactic story for children setting her life alongside events in world history.
Professor D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson also wrote about her for children saying that when he was a boy he knew her [...] well and intimately, and helped to feed her. He had also been allowed to keep some of her offspring from two generations.
Granny died on 4 August 1887 but the news was embargoed until 11 October 1887, apparently for State reasons, when The Scotsman published a lengthy obituary, In Memoriam–'Granny', saying while surrounded by several of its offspring [...] 'Granny' succumbed, being known to have lived sixty-seven years.
On 2 November, The New York Times reported the matter but it took until 28 December, by which time the death seems to have assumed a lesser importance, for the Southland Times of New Zealand to announce the Death of a Nondescript Celebrity.
White had predicted that Granny's resting place would be in a jar of alcohol in a museum but it seems her remains were not preserved.bHowever, Thompson wrote that her Scotsman obituary rightly showed that she was famous and was mourned by a great circle of friends. Swinney considered she had become, and remained, arguably the most famous and celebrated cnidarian of all time. The Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh still keeps an archive of papers about her.
More information: Royal Botanic Garden Edinburg
holds one in its net of wonder forever.
Jacques Yves Cousteau
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