Tag: Marine
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147/150: Nutty Facts about the Peanut Worm!
Animalia: Sipuncula: Phascolosomatidea: Phascolosomatida: Phascolosomatidae: Phascolosoma agassizii (Henri Marie Ducrotay de Blainville, 1827) Peanut worms, also known as Sipunculids are marine worms in that typically dwell in shallow waters. Sipuncula means “little tube” or “siphon” in Latin and refers to the introvert of peanut worms, a long sensitive tube ringed with tentacles which they can…
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142/150: A small creature with a long history
Animalia: Arthropoda: Ostracoda: Podocopida: Cyprididae: Cypridopsinae: Cypridopsis vidua (O. F. Müller, 1776) The Ostracods are an ancient crustacean that has been around for over 50 million years! Of the nearly 70,000 species described, only 13,000 are alive today, all others being discovered as fossils. Many ostracods have found use in the field of biostratigraphy –…
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131/150: What has a lion’s mane and lives under the sea? A jellyfish!
Animalia: Cnidaria: Scyphozoa: Semaeostomeae: Cyaneidae: Cyanea: Cyanea capillata (Linnaeus, 1758) The Lion’s Mane jellyfish is the largest species of jellyfish in the world. The largest specimen was found in 1870 at Massachusetts Bay, United States with a bell diameter of 2.3 meters and tentacles reaching 37 meters, which is longer than the length of a…
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105/150: Sea pens – not your typical corals
Animalia: Cnidaria: Anthozoa: Pennatulacea: Pennatulidae: Pennatula: Pennatula aculeata (Danielssen, 1860) Sea pens are colonial marine cnidarians found worldwide and normally at depths greater than 10 meters. Sea pens prefer deeper waters because they can avoid uprooting due to water turbulence. They live most of their lives in a sessile (immobile) state, however they can relocate…
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99/150: Lampshells – Watt do you mean it’s not a mussel?
Animalia: Brachiopoda: Rhynchonellata: Terebratulida: Terebratellidae: Terebrataliinae: Terebratalia: Terebratalia transversa (Sowerby, 1846) Lampshells, including Terebratalia transversa, belong to the phylum Brachiopoda, which translates to arm-foot in Greek. Brachiopods have been around for millions of years, dominating the oceans in the Paleozoic Era (541 to 252 million years ago), but now have a smaller distribution and are…
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81/150: This species is just peachy!
Animalia: Chordata: Ascidiacea: Stolidobranchia: Pyuridae: Halocynthia: Halocynthia pyriformis (Linnaeus) Sea peaches are part of the class of invertebrates Ascidiacea – known as sea squirts or tunicates. They are more closely related to chordates (animals with a back bone) than other invertebrates because at some point in their life stage they exhibit vertebrate characteristics such as…
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64/150: Birds of the Sea
Animalia: Echinodermata: Crinoidea: Comatulida: Antedonidae: Heliometrinae: Florometra: Florometra serratissima (AH Clark, 1907) While you wouldn’t think birds would be able to exist in the ocean, the common feather star Florometra serratissima could very well be considered the bird of the sea! They are able to move around either by grasping terrain with their claw-like cirri…
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54/150: Imagine a worm 60 metres long!
Animalia: Nemertea: Enopla: Monostilifera: Emplectonematidae: Paranemertes: Paranemertes peregrina (Coe, 1901) Nemertea, also known as “ribbon worm” is a phylum of marine invertebrate worm-like animals that are characterized by their eversible proboscis. The proboscis is used to catch prey and comes out of the nemertean’s body and stabs its prey with a venomous tip.