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Crinoid

Description:

Crinoids are marine animals that make up the class Crinoidea of the echinoderms (phylum Echinodermata). Crinoidea comes from the Greek word krinon, "a lily", and eidos, "form". They live both in shallow water and in depths as great as 6,000 metres (20,000 ft).[citation needed] Sea lilies refer to the crinoids which, in their adult form, are attached to the sea bottom by a stalk. Feather stars or comatulids refer to the unstalked forms. Crinoids are characterised by a mouth on the top surface that is surrounded by feeding arms. They have a U-shaped gut, and their anus is located next to the mouth. Although the basic echinoderm pattern of fivefold symmetry can be recognised, most crinoids have many more than five arms. Crinoids usually have a stem used to attach themselves to a substrate, but many live attached only as juveniles and become free-swimming as adults. There are only about 600 extant crinoid species, but they were much more abundant and diverse in the past. Some thick limestone beds dating to the mid- to late-Paleozoic are almost entirely made up of disarticulated crinoid fragments.

Notes:

The location on the map should be Malaysia and not Indonesia

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5 Comments

AlbertKang
AlbertKang 8 years ago

Thanks, @Mark, @Jae, @venusflytrap and @Antonio

Awesome capture Albert,congrats and thanks for sharing

CalebSteindel
CalebSteindel 8 years ago

craziness...

Jae
Jae 8 years ago

Fabulous spotting, Albert.

Mark Ridgway
Mark Ridgway 8 years ago

What an amazing animal. Thanks Albert.

AlbertKang
Spotted by
AlbertKang

Indonesia

Spotted on May 6, 2015
Submitted on May 7, 2015

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