What is this?

I saw this in the Marco River off the gulf in Florida. It was bobbing up and down and opening its mouth at the surface.

Oh man, I could've gone all day without seeing that, and hearing your description! heheheh
That's right out of a science fiction movie, maybe it's from the planet, "Glockamole"!

Very strange...

Randy

Sea Cucumber?

I don't know about a sea cucumber, I have seen a lot of 'em underwater, as far as I know, none float, they are really heavy critters, and slug-like.
Maybe though, there's all kinds of things that are the same, but not so much alike.

Randy

Looks like some kinda critter got himself in a big pot-a-trouble, is what it looks like to me. Weird.

Is it a mouth? I almost looks like a seed pod of somesort..I have been looking through the marine life in that area.lol.and can't find a thing

How large was it?

You can imagine some sort of rodent up amongst a tree's branches and leaves and coming upon this pod-like seed or fruit hanging nearby and starting in on it. Well, as he burrows deeper and enjoys his fruit he nibbles his way through the supporting stem and...plop!...into the drink he goes. Maybe it's a pickle cuz that's what he appears to be in.

Either that, or someone has been toying with their photoshop.

It looks like some stage of the caddis fly. The casing is made up of vegetative matter, and the insect will be shedding that casing as it reaches the surface, and will fly away.
That's my guess anyway!

The size isn't obvious from the picture. This was about 5 or 6 inches long if that helps. I thought mabe something got caught in a pod too, but it looked like it knew what it was doing bobbing up and down about once a second. Gave my wife and I the creeps.

Looks like a Mangrove root.

Here's another pic from a different angle.

I still think it was one of these.
http://www.bettatude.c​om/Misc/mangrove-seeds.jpg
Looks like there is a crab or something eating on it.

My first thought was a sea cucumber.

70ss wrote in post #9689624
I still think it was one of these.
http://www.bettatude.c​om/Misc/mangrove-seeds.jpg
Looks like there is a crab or something eating on it.

70SS, I think you got it -- a crab on a pod. At 200% it looks like a little crab. The way the thing bounced in the water and what looked like a mouth opening and closing when it surfaced sure had me going. Thanks all for taking the time to comment.