Actinia fragacea
Actinia fragacea, the strawberry anemone, is a sea anemone found from Norway to Africa, including the Azores, Canary Islands, Cape Verde, and the Mediterranean. It lives on rocks along the lower shore and in shallow water, usually less than 10 metres deep, sometimes partly buried in sand.
The strawberry anemone has a smooth red or dark red column with many greenish spots. Its tentacles are red or purplish. It is larger than the beadlet anemone and can reach about 100 millimetres across. A ring of pale blue, red, pink, or white spots called acrorhagi sits around the top inside of the column.
It lives in the northeastern and eastern Atlantic Ocean, from Norway, England, Scotland, and Ireland down to the Mediterranean and North Africa.
Reproduction is not well known, but it has separate sexes and lays eggs (oviparous); it does not seem to brood its young.
Other animals share the same common name, such as Corynactis californica in California and Corynactis annulata in southern Africa, as well as Urticina lofotensis in parts of the North Atlantic and the Pacific.
A famous beadlet anemone named “Granny” was found on Scotland’s east coast in 1828 by John Dalyell and studied for its behaviour; it may have been a strawberry anemone.
This page was last edited on 2 February 2026, at 11:00 (CET).