echinoderm
laelaps | April 15, 2010
Top of the encrusted surface of a brachiopod shell, showing the "war" between an edrioasteroid (star-shaped organism at center) and a fast-growing bryozoan colony. From Sprinkle and Rodgers 2010.
Back in the early days of paleontology, when the meaning and origin of fossils was still in doubt, some naturalists believed that the shells, shark teeth, and other petrified curiosities were attempts by the rock to imitate life. Fossils were not true vestiges of history, it was believed, but instead the product of some "plastic virtue" suffused throughout the non-living Creation. As naturalists…
zooillogix | April 6, 2008
Welcome to the eleventh and by far the most important, although surprisingly the most poorly formatted, installment of Carnival of the Blue. Before we get down to the watery, salty, and sometimes rubbery details, we wanted to take a moment to ponder the significance of Zooillogix's role as host of the eleventh COB. Why not the fifth or the ever popular tenth? Why not the second or maybe seventh, sixth, eighth, ninth or third?
Well, according to Biblestudy.org, "If ten is the number which marks the perfection of Divine order, then eleven is an addition to it, subversive of and undoing that…
zooillogix | March 21, 2008Researchers from New Zealand's National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research have discovered hundreds of potentially new species. Part of the International Polar Year survey program, the critters were hauled up from the briny depths around Antarctica. Among the 30,000 once living beings now in formaldehyde are huge sea spiders, jellyfish with 12-foot tentacles, enormous sea snails and starfish. The expedition was also made into a documentary entitled DeepStar Six...
Giant Macroptychaster sea star measuring 60 cm across
Antarctic toothfish (1.81 m long, 57 kg)
CR McClain from Deep…
edyong | March 13, 2008
Many animals have cunning ways of hiding from predators. But the larva of the sand dollar takes that to an extreme - it avoids being spotted by splitting itself into two identical clones.
Sand dollars are members of a group of animals called echinoderms, that include sea urchins and starfish. An adult sand dollar (Dendraster excentricus) is a flat, round disc that lives a sedate life on the sea floor. Its larva, also known as a pluteus, is very different, a small, six-armed creature that floats freely among the ocean's plankton.
A pluteus can't swim quickly, so there is no escape for one…
zooillogix | November 15, 2007Our most popular post from our Blogger days did not fair so well in the migration to SB and Movable Type. I am reposting it here now for posterity.
A relative of the starfish, crinoids are neither abundant nor well understood. Also known as "sea lilies" or "feather stars" the strange creatures consist of a mouthpart, feeding arms and generally have a stem that connects them to the sea floor. Scientists have long known that crinoids were capable of moving themselves, albeit at a very slow pace, to outmaneuver predators such as sea urchins. Their fastest speed had been clocked at .6 meters per…
zooillogix | May 7, 2007A relative of the starfish, crinoids are neither abundant nor well understood. Also known as "sea lilies" or "feather stars" the strange creatures consist of a mouthpart, feeding arms and generally have a stem that connects them to the sea floor. Scientists have long known that crinoids were capable of moving themselves, albeit at a very slow pace, to outmaneuver predators such as sea urchins. Their fastest speed had been clocked at .6 meters per hour, which means their entire existence is probably a lot like one of those dreams where you are being chased by something but can only move in…