65.
Deep sea tube worms - Riftia pachyptila
- These four to six foot "worms" have no mouth and no gut,
and live around deep-sea vents. Blood-red feathery plumes (tentacle groups),
where digestion occurs, emerge from white tubes. Riftia is so different that it has been
placed in a new and distinct phylum: the Vestimentifera.
66.
Vent crab - Cyanograea praedator
- Vent crabs are one of the characteristic animals
associated with hydrothermal vents. They are completely white, and occur in high
abundance in small areas.
67.
Tube anemone - Class Anthozoa (Phylum Cnidaria)
- Tube anemones are similar in basic features to other
anemones but unlike them, each lives in a slime tube. They are widely distributed in
tropical and subtropical waters. See 2, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 28.
68.
Tube sponges
- Sponges have a porous skeleton of interlocking spicules
(bony, needle-like structures), glasslike rods, or horny fibers. Food is obtained by
filtering water as it moves through the body of the sponge. Sponges can regenerate by restoration
of damaged or lost parts or by complete regeneration of an adult from fragments or even
single cells. See 3, 26, and 27.
69.
Giant deep sea angler - Ceratias holboelli
- Called an angler because its front dorsal fin ray is
modified into a luminescent lure at the tip, it reaches about three feet in length.
Males attach themselves to a female fish and grow to be a permanent part of her, losing
their mouths, digestive systems, and gills.
70.
Giant squid - Architeuthis princeps
- Cephalopods are the largest invertebrates. One giant
squid was reported to have been almost 60 feet long, including the 20-foot tentacles.
Architeuthis swims in the same way as other squids, whether by jet propulsion or by using
the fins. This squid is a favored prey of sperm whales. See 42.
71.
Ratfish - Chimaera phantasma
- Most chimaeras have bodies that taper toward
the rear to a slender tail. The snout is rounded and conical with big eyes located on
the sides of the head, and there is only a single gill opening. Ratfishes have teeth
fused into large, sharp incisors at the front, giving them the appearance of rodents.
72.
Japanese spider crab - Macrocheira kaempferi
- Probably the biggest living arthropod; this crab lives in
the North Pacific near Japan between 150-1000 feet. Reaching over 12 feet from leg tip
to leg tip, and weighing as much as 40 pounds, its body is only about 15 inches in
diameter.
73.
Deep sea jelly - Periphylla sp.
- The deep bell-shaped body lined by dark pigment probably
masks light from the bioluminescent animals it eats. Jellyfish move by rhythmic muscular
contractions of the bell, providing a slow jet propulsion. Hanging downward from the
center is a stalk-like structure with the mouth at its tip, opening into the main body
cavity . Unlike some other jellyfish, Periphylla has very short tentacles.
