Toxic July hopefully won’t last too much longer, and I’ve just realised this issue will come out on ‘Independence Day’ for the assorted Americans on this site. So it seems as if the Common Kingslayer, last week’s issue, would fit in very well with them on the 4^th of July. This week’s animal, while not as deadly, is sure to bring a nightmare requiring cleansing by fire, hope you guys enjoy.

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Issue #129 – Colossendeis colossea

Kingdom – Animalia

Phylum – Arthropoda

Class – Pycnogonida

Order – Pantopodea

Family – Colossendeidae

Genus – Colossendeis

Species – colossea

Related Species – Colossendeis colossea is one of the many species of ‘sea spider’ found in the genus Colossendeis (1)

Range – C.colossea is found on the seabed in the cold waters of the Southern Ocean

All Legs

Colossendeis colossea is the largest extant pycnogonid with a leg span of over 50cm in diameter, and is often a pale yellow or red colour. The body of C.colossea is made up of two parts, a trait it shares with most arachnids, the cephalothorax and the abdomen. Due to the narrow construction of the main body, many of the essential organs including the digestive system have partially migrated into the animals legs. While locomotion is largely restricted to walking on the sea floor, C.colossea can swim short distances by pulsing its legs in an umbrella movement.

C.colossea like many of the Pantapodea is a carnivore, with the creature hunting slow moving or immobile soft blooded prey such as worms, anemones and sponges using its proboscis to puncture its victim’s skins and suck out the internal fluids (2). When fully grown C.colossea probably has few predators to worry about, although at current very little is known about the sea-floor under the ice shelves of Antarctica.

When it comes to breeding C.colossea stimulates the female into laying her eggs using two pincer tipped modified legs known as ovigers. Once completed the male fertilizes the eggs and then carries the around in his ovigers until the young hatch (3). From there it’s probable that the male continues to care for the larvae until they are able to walk on their own, and begin life as long legged stalkers of the ocean floor.

Five Fun Colessendies colossea Facts

Despite their arachnid like appearance and their colloquial name of ‘Sea Spiders’, Colessendies colossea is only distantly related to terrestrial spiders and their allies.

Sea Spiders are in fact part of a group that’s known as Pantopodea which translates from Latin to ‘All Leg’ in reference to their spindly appearance.

While most sea spiders have only four pairs of legs, some of the group have five or even six pairs of walking legs.

Sea Spiders don’t have lungs or gills, instead absorbing oxygen directly from the water through passive diffusion.

Due to the thinness of their legs, the brachial muscles consists of one single cell that is surrounded by connective tissue which then connects the muscles to the exoskeleton

Bibliography

1 - www.arkive.org

2 - https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn27978-zoologger-the-giant-sea-spider-that-sucks-life-out-of-its-prey/

3 - http://animals.mom.me/reproduction-life-cycle-sea-spiders-2923.html

Picture References

1 - http://images.marinespecies.org/resized/76123_colossendeis-colossea.jpg

2 - http://destepti.ro/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/Colossendeis-colossea.jpg

3 - http://66.media.tumblr.com/d67c6aa7f6abdfae750c70fb6522268e/tumblr_mt4mjly3IE1rxyvj1o2_1280.jpg

Talk about something spooky lurking down in the gloom. Next week we head back to terra-firma as we look at an animal that looks like a worm, behaves like a worm and lives like a worm and yet… Until then make sure to critic, comment and suggest future issues as well as making sure you check past issues in Impurest’s Bestiary.

Many Thanks and Happy Independence Day

Impurest Cheese

Want more IGTA? For something equally creepy, click here to check out the ghastly Bearded Ghoul. Or for something that looks imposing, click here to see the king sized creep crawly known as the Robber Crab.