#803: Violet Sea Snail

I confess, I initially chose the Violet Sea Snail merely for its name and because I never have enough invertebrates for this alphabet. But once I started learning about it, I realised that here was another awesome animal I had never heard of before.

The Violet Sea Snail is a marine mollusc with an unusual hunting technique. He excudes mucus, trapping bubbles of air to create a "raft", to which it clings, upside down. He then travels with the waves and the wind, preying on - get this! - free-floating hydrozoans, such as the Portugese man o' war. All Violet Sea Snails begin life as a male, changing to a female as she ages. Eggs are retained by the female until the larvae hatch.

#724: Star-nosed Mole

Star-nose Moles are perhaps one of the strangest looking mammals in the world. She lives in the north-eastern areas of North America, and inhabits wet lowland areas. Many of her tunnels exit underwater, and she is a strong swimmer. Her most identifiable features are the 22 fleshy appendages surrounding her snout. These act as sensory receptors, helping her navigate and find prey in her subterranean home. These are extremely sensitive, and she is even able to scent underwater.

Creature Feature #579: Pelican Spider

I recentlystumbled upon this arachnid whilst researching something else entirely and couldn't believe it existed and that I've never heard of it! I mean, a spider with a neck???!!! And that's ignoring the long jaws. But real it is, indeed. And, I suppose if you can get weird looking insects, weird looking arachnids are not entirely out of the question.

The Pelican Spider is named such for its completely superficial resemblance to the water bird. She is also sometimes known as the Assassin Spider because her favoured prey is spiders. She does not build a web, using her silk mainly to help manouvere. No larger than a grain of rice, her elongated jaws allow her to impale her prey and inject it with venom, whilst holding it far enough away that it cannot harm her.

Firstly, the Spider uses her short front legs like antennae, to detect a spider web. Once located, she begins to move slowly across the web, so slowly that the resident spider feels no impending sense of doom, but may venture over to investigate the slight plucking. Then, she strikes, her jaws impale and the prey is poisoned. Once movement has ceased, she lowers it to her mouth - which is situated at the base of her neck.

There are 25 species found in Australia, South Africa and Madagascar.

Creature Feature #534: Olm

Olm are a species of cave-dwelling salamander. Due to the nature of his home - deep below the earth with no light source - the Olm is not only blind, but his eyes are undeveloped. He leads an entirely aquatic lifestyle, never leaving the water, and exhibits neotony (as also seen in the axolotl and the mudpuppy) retaining his gills into adulthood. His sense of smell and hearing are excellent, and help him locate  prey - in the form of crustaceans, molluscs and insects. Gregarious in nature, Olm will gather together beneath rocks. Sexually active males, however, become territorial.

Olm are found in European cave systems and are Vulnerable to extinction.

Creature Feature #526: Oarfish

The Oarfish is one of the largest fish in the sea - an adult Giant Oarfish can grow up to 11 m in length. He is a solitary fish, venturing to depths of 1,000 m. Despite his size, his diet consists primarily of zooplankton, small fish, jellyfish and squid. The name "Oarfish" may come from his shape, or from the fact that he uses his elongated pelvic fins to row himself through the water.

Creature Feature #497: Nautilus

The Nautilus are primitive members of the Cephalopod Class. He is characterised by his logarithmic spiral shell and mass of tentacles (up to 90). If threatened, he is able to withdraw entirely into his shell, covering it with a hood. Although his tentacles lack the adhesive pads of his relatives, they are ridged to allow him a firm grip on any prey that might come within grasp. He uses these and his powerful bill to rip crustaceans from the rocks to which they might attach themselves.

Creature Feature #189: Echidna

The Echidna is a monotreme - a mammal that lays eggs. She is a relatively small, plump creature equipped with a long snout that she uses to sniff out worms and insect larvae. Her body is covered in short spines and coarse hair, offering her some protection from predators. There are three species: two Long-Beaked species, of which one is depicted here, and the Short-Beaked. All are equipped with sturdy claws for ripping apart logs and long tongues, for lapping up insects, meaning that they superficially resemble anteaters.
 In breeding season, as many as ten males will form a line, with the smallest males at the end, and trail the receptive female. Two weeks after mating, she will implant one tiny, fertile egg into her rear-facing pouch. It hatches after ten days. The infant Echidna is known as a puggle, and he will live in the pouch for 2-3 months, before being pushed out to see the world.

Creature Feature #151: Daphnia

The Daphnia is a tiny crustacean, measuring no more than 5mm in length; she is a component of plankton. Various species populate different habitats - from freshwater to marine, including acidic swamps. Sometimes referred to as "water fleas" her motion through the water somewhat resembles that of a flea. Many species are translucent, which makes her popular with scientists as one can study her entire system, including her beating heart - which leads to studying the effects of caffeine and nicotine on heart rate. Reproduction is both asexual and sexual . Eggs are released regularly with each moult, but towards the end of the growing season she produces a few male offspring which fertilise the last, hardier eggs so that they will withstand harsher conditions.
(I'm confused too, crustaceans are weird)

Creature Feature #120: Colugo

The Colugo is also known as the "flying lemur" which is something of a misnomer for she is not a lemur and she does not fly. She is in fact the most sophisticated gliding mammal, with her patagium (flying membrane) extending further than that of other gliding mammals. She can glide for up to 70m without losing height. She is not, however, a very capable climbing. Her lack of opposable thumbs and relatively weak limbs mean she must claw her way along the bark in a series of short hops. She is fairly large - about 40cm in length - and mostly solitary. Her baby is born after only 60 days gestation as a tiny, undeveloped infant which clings to her belly. To protect him, she curls her tail up to form a rudimentary pouch with her patagium. He grows slowly and will not be fully mature until he is two-three years old.

Creature Feature #117: Coelacanth

The Coelacanth stirred a lot of attention when one was fished up in 1938 - it had been considered extinct for 65 million years. Once there were a number of species, now there remains just two. Thay are large fish who make their home in deep ocean trenches (150 to 700m deep) off the coast of Africa. His skull is hinged, allowing him to raise his head whilst feeding on other fish. His fins, also, follow an interesting arrangement, leading to some suggestions that he may be an ancestor of  the first terrestrial life. His pectoral and Pelvic fins are not dismilar to that of terrestrial vertebrates. The young develop inside the mother, within a yolk-filled egg sac connected to her belly. As the youngsters grow, the sac decreases in size until eventually  she gives birth to up to 26 pups. Yes, like sharks, baby coelacanth are called pups.

Creature Feature #116: Coconut Crab

This freakish fellow is the largest land invertebrate in the world. His body can grow up to 40cm long, with the limbs extending him to 1m. A member of the Hermit Crab Family, when he is young he lives in empty gastropod shells, but as he matures he forms his own hard exoskeleton. He can be found on islands across the Indian Ocean, but on those with a large human population he has been extirpated (become locally extinct). This is, obviously, because a crab this big is going to find favour on the dinner table. He can climb trees and his claws are strong enough to crack coconuts, but coconuts do not form the major part of his diet. He prefers softer fruit, carrion and smaller crabs. They are likely responsible for the disappearance of many a shipwrecker-then-deceased sailor.  They will drown, which is a bit of an issue because they are still dependent on the ocean for reproduction. The eggs hatch into larvae where they grow through several stages. After about a month they find themselves a nice gastropod shell to wear and come ashore with other hermit crabs to begin their landlubber's life.

Creature Feature #107: Clam Worm

The Clam Worm is a marine annelid found throughout the North West Atlantic, the gulf of Maine and South Africa, at depths of . They spend much of their time scavenging the shallow sea bed for worms and algae, where they also play an important role in the diet of fish and crustaceans.  To protect themselves, they form a sheath of hardened mucus about their body. During lunar phases in the spring and summer, the Clam Worm may undergo a process called epigamy. Here they transforms into a morph capable of reproduction, with the internal digestive organs atrophing and the development of swimming appendages. Their main purpose now is to release eggs or sperm, and after that, they die.