where does a sea spider live?

Answers to where does a sea spider live

Pycnogonids or sea spiders are odd looking creatures which live in the seas and oceans of the world and normally have 4 pairs of walking legs, but they may have 5 or even 6 pairs in some cases. They have practically no body and a proboscis. They have been relatively little studies and there is a great deal we still do not know about them.

The fossil record of pycnogonids is very meagre, Paleopantopus maucheri is an early Devonion fossil is one of the few well documented species. Despite this lack of hard evidence, scientists deduce from morphological and embryonic studies that the Pycnogonids are an old lineage of animals, though nobody can really put a date on their first appearance.

Pycnogonids are found all over the world, from coastal tropical waters to the poles. They are also found at depths as great as 7,000 metres deep, though they are far more common in shallower waters. They range in size from a few millimetres of leg-span to giants with a legspan of 75 centimetres (2.8 ft). As of the late 1990's there were about 1,000 species known to science divided into 8 families and 86 genera. They are common in the Mediterranean, the Carribean and around the poles, and not that difficult to find in rock pools once you get your eye in.

Sea spiders, also called Pantopoda or pycnogonids ('pycnogonid' = Greek for 'thick knee'), are marine arthropods of class Pycnogonida. They are cosmopolitan, found especially in the Mediterranean and Caribbean Seas and the Arctic and Antarctic Oceans. There are over 1300 known species, ranging in size from 1-10 mm, to over 90 cm in some deep water species. Most are toward the smaller end of this range in relatively shallow depths, however, they can grow to be quite large in Antarctic waters.

"Sea spiders" are not actual spiders. They are not even arachnids, but more distantly related arthropods.

These small animals live in many different parts of the world, from Australia, New Zealand, and the Pacific coast of the United States, to the Mediterranean and the Caribbean, to the north and south poles. They are most common in shallow waters, but can be found as deep as 7,000 metres, and live in both marine and estuarine habitats. Pycnogonids are well camouflaged beneath the rocks and among the algae that are found along shorelines.

Sea spiders either walk along the bottom with their stilt-like legs or swim just above it using an umbrella pulsing motion. Most are carnivorous and feed on cnidarians, sponges, polychaetes and bryozoans. Sea spiders are generally predators or scavengers.

Sea Spider, a sea-dwelling animal that looks somewhat like a spider. There are about 500 species. Sea spiders are found in all oceans. Species found in coastal waters are usually small and have a leg span of about 1 inch (2.5 cm), those living at great depths, up to 24 inches (60 cm).

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