Harpacticoida
Copepod from the order Harpacticoida
The Harpacticoida form an order of copepods. This includes 463 genera with about 3000 species worldwide. It is very small copepods, mainly on the bottom of the sea, the sand gap system of beaches, but are also found in groundwater. In freshwater species occurring mainly belong to the families Ameiridae, Parastenocarididae and Canthocamptidae, for example Canthocamptus tasmaniae. Few species of this order live in the plankton. In the meiofauna of the sediments, however, they form the second largest group after the nematodes.
Features
The Harpacticoida have relatively short first antennae with more than eight members, unlike other copepods. Since these antennas of locomotion in the water used, the Harpacticoida poor swimmers and therefore usually live on or in the ground. The second antennae are biramose. The body shape of these copepods is cylindrical, either vermiform or with a conspicuous broad abdomen.
Way of life
The majority of harpacticoiden copepods belongs to the benthos of the seas. They live in the mud and sand in the gaps of the coasts and beaches, where they feed on unicellular algae, cyanobacteria, flagellates, ciliates, fungi, and heterotrophic and chemoautotrophic bacteria. Some species build tubes in the mud or in the algae mats, which they line with a secretion.
System
The order Harpacticoida currently comprises 54 families:
- Adenopleurellidae
- Aegisthidae
- Ambunguipedidae
- Ameiridae
- Ancorabolidae
- Argestidae
- Balaenophilidae
- Cancrincolidae
- Canthocamptidae
- Canuellidae
- Cerviniidae
- Chappuisiidae
- Cletodidae
- Cletopsyllidae
- Clytemnestridae
- Cristacoxidae
- Cylindropsyllidae
- Darcythompsoniidae
- Ectinosomatidae
- Euterpinidae
- Hamondiidae
- Harpacticidae
- Huntemanniidae
- Laophontidae
- Laophontopsidae
- Latiremidae
- Leptastacidae
- Leptopontiidae
- Longipediidae
- Louriniidae
- Metidae
- Miraciidae Dana, 1846 including Diosaccidae Sars, 1906
- Orthopsyllidae
- Paramesochridae
- Parastenheliidae
- Parastenocarididae
- Peltidiidae
- Phyllognathopodidae
- Porcellidiidae
- Pseudotachidiidae
- Rhizothricidae
- Rotundiclipeidae
- Styracothoracidae
- Superornatiremidae
- Tachidiidae
- Tegastidae
- Tetragonicipitidae
- Thalestridae
- Thompsonulidae
- Tisbidae