Star sand

Baculogypsina sphaerulata

•If you pick up a handful of coral sand and look very carefully at each grain chances are you will see a star sand. You will see one of the children of the North Star and the Southern Cross that has fallen to earth OR the shell case of a foraminifera, a tiny amoeba-like creature that extends the cytoplasm of its cell out like legs and attaches itself to turf algae at the bottom.

•The shells of these things make up 30% of a coral Island, they are small but there are billions of them and they have been around for millions of years. The pyramids are actually made from compressed star sand, from the children of stars.