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Nadine
Age: 42
Joined: 23 Jan 2006
Posts: 26
Location: Germany
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Morphology of freshwater shrimp
They all belong to the family of Crustacea Decapoda (10 footed crayfish such as river crayfish, lobsters, crabs, shrimps; of lat. crusta, bowl / gr. deca = 10 and pos=foot)
The body can be subdivided in two sections (Tagmata), the Cephalothorax (the piece of head and chest) in the front, and in the back the abdomen.
Cephalothorax:
Here the tergites (back shields) of the segments are united and form a carapace together with lateral creases leading to the rear of the head, the carapax (of gr. charax = fixing and pagios = firmly).
Two complex eyes protrude at the sides of the carapax (synonymous: facette eyes, often also called shaft eyes), the head carries 2 pairs of antennae. At the basis of the second pair of antennae there is a scale-like exopodite, the scaphocerite.
There are a pair of maxillae (for chewing or scrunching of food or as gripping tool in the case of transport and/or manipulation of objects) and two pairs of maxillipeds (foot jaws) that have pincers; the first pair in particular can be quite large e.g. for Macrobrachium.
The other thoracic extremities form the peraeopods (of gr. peraioo = transport over there). The basic parts of the peraeopods carry the gills. A lateral crease of the carapax covers these gills like a roof and thus forms a breathing cave. A particular spoon-like part of the 2. maxille, the scaphognathite (of gr. skaphos = boat) produces a constant water flow through this cave by incessant movement.
Abdomen:
The abdomen consists of the abdominal segments and the tail fan. The abdominal segments, contrary to those in the thoracical region, have not merged and thus form a mobile floating body. This "flexible" structure helps the maneuverability when swimming.
The abdominal extremities, the pleopods, serve as swimming feet and, when the shrimp is walking, are folded under the abdomen. The last pair, the uropods, form the tail fan together with the telson.
Source : RWTH Aachen
German version written by Blue Shrimp http://www.garnelenforum.de/ftopic1038.html |
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