#phoronids

[patheticmosasaur1]

today's invertebrate...................phoronis australis

he makes really tiny marble sculptures and ornaments with nice fortunes written on them. they're very great trinkets and I highly recommend giving some to a friend or significant other as a representation of your love for their existence¡¡

but if you ever see how he makes them you'd never want to touch them or look at them again so for your safety I'm not going to tell you how they're made. all you need to know is that it does NOT involve his luscious swirly lophophores. those are merely for show

glorpiness rating: venineth

photographed by Chaloklum Diving (CC BY 3.0)

it kinda looks like it has a face lol

[symbiotic-science]

Parents unknown—Mysterious larvae found in Panama's two oceans

Under the microscope, sea water reveals the larval stages of little-known marine creatures called phoronids (horseshoe worms), but finding their parents is another story. Although such fanciful larvae caught the eye of scientists studying plankton—the tiny, drifting plants and animals in the world's oceans—as long ago as the 1800s, there are only about 15 species of phoronids known worldwide, based on adult specimens. A study of phoronid larvae published this week by scientists at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) in Panama has detected eight potentially new species.

Under the microscope, sea water reveals the larval stages of little-known marine creatures called phoronids (horseshoe worms), but finding their parents is another story. Although such fanciful larvae caught the eye of scientists studying plankton—the tiny, drifting plants and animals in the world's oceans—as long ago as the 1800s, there are only about 15 species of phoronids known worldwide, based on adult specimens. A study of phoronid larvae published this week by scientists at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) in Panama has detected eight potentially new species.

"The global diversity of small, rare marine animals like phoronids is grossly underestimated," said STRI staff-scientist Rachel Collin. "We don't know what animals are out there, and we know even less about what their role might be in the world's oceans."

Because phoronid larvae swim and drift in seawater, they are much easier to sample than their adult forms, which live on the sea floor within sands, sediment or rubble. And the larvae do not look like the adults, making it difficult to tell which larva belongs to which adult without doing a sort of paternity testing: comparing larval DNA sequences to the DNA of their potential parents.

[patheticmosasaur1]

today's invertebrates.............eatoniana namaquensis and phoronis ijimai

these 2 strange entrepreneurs come from distant lands to present to you an amazing opportunity for a deal: if you pay them a measily sum of 5 million yoo they'll allow you access to the nunamina forascena, a strange contraption that allows its user to summon different kinds of meats by singing! for 5 million yua only!!!

and this isn't even the greatest deal from this duo, as for only 2 thousand plims, you can have your very own mucus cube!!! for you!!!! to take home!!! mucus!!! cube!!! a mucus cube only for you!! isn't that just the greatest deal ever!?!?!?!?!

.........jollyness rating: 35% sing a christmas song to the nunamina and you might summon the elusive christmas flesh

Eatoniana namaquensis photographed by Cecile Roux (cecileroux), uploaded to iNaturalist! link to original observation

Phoronis ijimai photographed by Katherine Panfilova (badgers), also uploaded to iNaturalist! link to original observation

[scientificillustration]

Phoronis par Marc de Selys-Longchamps ; herausgegeben von der zoologischen Station zu Neapel.

"Phoronids (scientific name Phoronida, sometimes called horseshoe worms) are a phylum of marine animals that filter-feed with a lophophore (a "crown" of tentacles), and build upright tubes of chitin to support and protect their soft bodies."

[scientificillustration]

Phoronis architecta : its life history, anatomy and breeding habits / by William Keith Brooks and Rheinart Parker Cowles.

This species is now called Phoronis psammophila Cori, 1889. The larva has a different name: Actinotrocha sabatieri.

[scientificillustration]

Phoronis par Marc de Selys-Longchamps ; herausgegeben von der zoologischen Station zu Neapel.

This isn't a dancing alien but a Phoronid or horseshoe worm