#copepoda

[dailybugfacts]

Do copepods count as bugs?

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TODAY'S FACT IS

Did you know that Attheyella Yemanjae is a species of copepod only known to be found in Campo Úmido de la Onça in Brazil? This aquatic crustacean is named after Yemanjá, a Candomblé sea goddess and a Yoruba water spirit.

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[every-day-creechur]

Diaptomus spp.

A genus of freshwater copepods with a single eye spot, found in the Northern Hemisphere.

image by GLERL

[wikipediapictures]

Copepod

“Copepods of various species. Photos were taken using a Biolam R-11 microscope. For photography, the dark field method was combined with polarization. Thanks to polarizing microscopy, the glow of muscle stripes in the bodies of some crustaceans is visible. Each photo is the result of panoramic shooting and focus stacking.” - via Wikimedia Commons (original description translated from Russian using Google Translate)

[bestanimal]

Round 2 - Arthropoda - Copepoda

(Sources - 1, 2, 3, 4)

Copepoda is a class of small crustaceans found in nearly every freshwater and saltwater biome, including the arctic. Some are planktonic, some live in sediment (benthic), some live underground in sinkholes or caves, some are parasitic, and some even live in wet terrestrial places such as bogs and the water-filled cups of bromeliads. They are small, usually 1 to 2 mm long, with a teardrop-shaped body and two pairs of antennae. Some polar copepods can reach up to 1 cm long. Most copepods have a single compound eye, usually bright red and in the centre of their transparent head. Subterranean species may be eyeless, and a couple genera have two eyes. Free-living copepods have a head fused with the first one or two thoracic segments, with the remainder of the thorax being comprised of three to five limbed segments. The first pair of appendages are maxillipeds, limbs used for feeding. The second pair beat like oars, aiding in swimming. They have a narrow abdomen with five leg-less segments, with tail-like rami at the tip. Meanwhile, the anatomy of parasitic copepods are so widely diverse that I simply do not have space to talk about it here. Copepods have incredibly fast reflexes, due to well-developed myelin sheaths, allowing them to escape predators at high speeds, often porpoising out of the water. Like ostracods, many species also use bioluminescence as a defense mechanism, using it to distract predators (see gif below).

When they are ready to mate, some copepod females leave a trail of pheromones for males to follow. When mating, the male will grip the female with his antennae and produce an adhesive spermatophore, then transfer it to the female’s genital opening. After fertilization, the eggs will sometimes be laid directly into the water column, or, in some species, the female will carry them in a sac until they hatch. In some pond-dwelling species, the eggs can remain dormant in the case of the pond drying up, waiting to hatch until more favorable conditions are present. The larvae hatch with a head and a tail but no true thorax or abdomen. In fact, the larvae look so different from their adult forms that many of them were once thought to be different species! They will moult 5-6 times before becoming a copepodid larva which resembles the adult, sans some limbs and segments. After 5 more moults they will reach adulthood.

The oldest known fossils of copepods are from the Late Carboniferous, but due to their small size and fragility, they are rare in the fossil record. However, these fossilized copepods seemed to belong to an extant (still living) family, meaning that copepods may have already reached the forms they are in now by the Carboniferous.

How do you feel about Copepoda? (Remember to vote for your favorite animal within this group, not how you feel about the group as a whole!)

One or more of my favorite animals is in Copepoda

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I am neutral about all of these animals

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Voting ended onNov 17, 2024

Propaganda under the cut:

Copepods are dominant members of zooplankton and are food for many species of fish. Some scientists say they form the largest animal biomass on earth, matched only by Antarctic Krill.

The surface layers of the ocean are the world’s largest carbon sink, absorbing harmful greenhouse gasses: about 2 billion tons of carbon a year, the equivalent of a third of human carbon emissions. Copepods contribute to a large part of this, feeding near the surface at night, and then carrying these gasses to deeper water with them. Their moulted exoskeletons, feces, and respiration all transfer carbon to the deep sea.

Live copepods are a popular addition to saltwater fish tanks, both as a food source for hard-to-feed fish, and as a clean-up crew.

Copepods are sometimes added to water-storage containers to control mosquitos, as some species will eat mosquito larvae. Copepods have been used successfully in Vietnam to control mosquitoes carrying dengue fever, and trials to employ this method are also underway in Thailand and the southern United States.

Sheldon J. Plankton, of “Spongebob Squarepants” fame, is a copepod!

[taxonomytournament]

Taxonomy Tournament: Crustaceans

Copepoda. This class is made up of copepods, microscopic aquatic zooplankton, though some live in sediments or are parasites.

Branchiopoda. This class is made up of fairy shrimp, clam shrimp, water fleas, and the shield shrimp. All members have gills on their appendages, including the mouthparts.

Which clade of animals is better?

Copepoda

Branchiopoda

Show results

Voting ended onJan 27, 2024

[wikipediapictures]

Copepod

“Copepods are aquatic animals like most crustaceans. They live en masse in all depths of both sea and fresh water, as well as in puddles, swamps, and some species in moist moss and wasteland. Among them are also parasites whose appearance can be changed beyond recognition and which live on fish and other aquatic animals. Free-living copepods are only a few millimeters long (0,5-2mm) and play an important part in the water body's food chain: they reproduce relatively quickly, and by feeding on tiny microscopic organisms, they themselves are constantly food for larger aquatic animals. Around 8,500 species of copepods are known in the world, according to the latest data, 82 are known in Estonia, but the existence of 100 species is assumed.” - via Wikimedia Commons

[wikipediapictures]

Copepod

“Lernaeolophus sultanus (Copepoda, Pennellidae), a parasite of the deep-sea fish Pristipomoides filamentosus (Lutjanidae), off New Caledonia. Scale, each scale division – 1 mm.” - via Wikimedia Commons

[wikipediapictures]

Copepod