Argonaut (animal)
Argonauts Temporal range:
| |
---|---|
![]() | |
Female Argonauta argo with its eggs bulging out of its damaged shell | |
Scientific classification ![]() | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Mollusca |
Class: | Cephalopoda |
Order: | Octopoda |
Family: | Argonautidae |
Genus: | Argonauta Linnaeus, 1758 |
Type species | |
Argonauta argo Linnaeus, 1758
| |
Species | |
*Species status questionable. | |
Synonyms | |
|
The argonauts (
Argonauts are found in
Of its names, "argonaut" means "sailor of the Argo".[3] "Paper nautilus" is derived from the Greek ναυτίλος nautílos, which literally means "sailor", as paper nautili were thought to use two of their arms as sails.[4] This is not the case, as argonauts swim by expelling water through their funnels.[5] The chambered nautilus was later named after the argonaut, but belongs to a different cephalopod order, Nautilida.
Description
Sexual dimorphism and reproduction
Argonauts exhibit extreme
The males lack the dorsal
-
Mature female A. nodosa
-
Juvenile female A. hians
-
Immature male A. hians
Eggcase
Female argonauts produce a laterally-compressed
The eggcase contains a bubble of air that the animal captures at the surface of the water and uses for buoyancy, similarly to other shelled cephalopods, although it does not have a chambered phragmocone.[7] Once thought to contribute to occasional mass strandings on beaches, the air bubble is under sophisticated control, evident from the behaviour of animals from which air has been removed under experimental diving conditions.[9][10][11] This system to attain neutral buoyancy is effective only at the relatively shallow depths of the upper 10 meters of the water column. Young females with mantle lengths less than 9 millimeters are shell-less like the males, with both having been found in waters between 50 and 200 meters.[9]
Most other octopuses lay eggs in
-
Female A. nodosa with its eggcase
-
The eggcase of A. argo
-
The eggcase of A. nodosa
-
The eggcase of A. hians
Beak
The beaks of Argonauta species are distinctive, being characterised by a very small
Feeding and defense
Feeding mostly occurs during the day. Argonauts use tentacles to grab prey and drag it toward the mouth. It then bites the prey to inject it with
to drill into the organism, then inject the toxin.Argonauts are capable of altering their color. They can blend in with their surroundings to avoid
Argonauts are preyed upon by tunas, billfishes, and dolphins. Shells and remains of argonauts have been recorded from the stomachs of Alepisaurus ferox and Coryphaena hippurus.[15]
Male argonauts have been observed residing inside aggregate salps (Pegea socia), although little is known about this relationship.[16]
Classification
![]() |
The genus Argonauta contains up to seven
Four extant species are widely considered valid:[17]
- Argonauta argo Linnaeus, 1758
- Argonauta hians Lightfoot, 1786
- Argonauta nodosusLightfoot, 1786
- Argonauta nouryi Lorois, 1852
Several additional taxa are either treated as valid species or regarded as
- Argonauta boettgeriMaltzan, 1881
- Argonauta cornutusConrad, 1854
- Argonauta pacificusDall, 1871
A number of extinct species have also been described:
- †Argonauta absyrtus Martill & Barker, 2006
- †Argonauta biarmata Ponzi, 1876[18]
- †Argonauta itoigawai Tomida, 1983
- †Argonauta joanneus Hilber, 1915
- †Argonauta oweri Fleming, 1945
- †Argonauta sismondai Bellardi, 1872
- †Argonauta tokunagai Yokoyama, 1913
The extinct species
Dubious or uncertain taxa
The following taxa associated with the family Argonautidae are of uncertain taxonomic status:[20]
Binomial name and author citation | Current systematic status | Type locality | Type repository |
---|---|---|---|
Argonauta arctica Fabricius, 1780 | Undetermined | Unresolved; ?Tullukaurfak, Greenland | Unresolved |
Argonauta bibula Röding, 1798 | Undetermined | Unresolved | Unresolved |
Argonauta compressa Blainville, 1826 | Undetermined | Mer de Indes | Unresolved; [other Blainville types at MNHN] [not reported by Lu et al. (1995)] |
Argonauta conradi Parkinson, 1856 | Species of uncertain status [fide Robson (1932:200)] | " New Nantucket, Pacific Ocean " |
Unresolved |
Argonauta cornu Gmelin, 1791 | Undetermined | Unresolved | Unresolved; LS? |
Argonauta cymbium Linné , 1758 |
Non-cephalopod; foraminiferous shell [fide Von Martens (1867:103) | ||
Argonauta fragilis Parkinson, 1856 | Species of uncertain status [fide Robson (1932:200)] | Not designated | Unresolved |
Argonauta geniculata Gould, 1852 | Species of uncertain status [fide Robson (1932:200)] | Near Sugarloaf Mountain, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil |
Type not extant [fide Johnson (1964:32)] |
Argonauta maxima Dall , 1871 |
Nomen nudum | ||
Argonauta navicula Lightfoot , 1786 |
Species dubium [fide Rehder (1967:11)] | Not designated | Unresolved |
Argonauta rotunda Perry, 1811 | Non-cephalopod; Carcinaria sp. [fide Robson (1932:201)] | ||
Argonauta rufa Owen, 1836 | Incertae sedis [fide Robson (1932:181)] | "Indian seas" ["South Pacific ocean" fide Owen (1842:114)] | Unresolved; Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons? Holotype |
Argonauta sulcata Lamarck , 1801 |
Nomen nudum | ||
Argonauta tuberculata f. aurita Von Martens, 1867 | Undetermined | Unresolved | ZMB |
Argonauta tuberculata f. mutica Von Martens, 1867 | Undetermined | Coast of Brazil | ZMB Holotype |
Argonauta tuberculata f. obtusangula Von Martens, 1867 | Undetermined | Not designated | ZMB Syntypes |
Argonauta vitreus Gmelin, 1791 | Undetermined | Not designated | Unresolved; LS? |
Octopus (Ocythoe) raricyathus Blainville, 1826 | Undetermined [Argonauta?] | Not designated | MNHN Holotype; specimen not extant [fide Lu et al. (1995:323)] |
Ocythoe punctata Say, 1819 | Argonauta sp. [fide Robson (1929d:215)] | Atlantic Ocean near the North American coast (from stomach of dolphin) | Unresolved; ANSP? Holotype [not traced by Spamer and Bogan (1992)] |
Tremoctopus hirondellei Joubin, 1895 | Argonauta or Ocythoe [fide Thomas (1977:386)] |
44°28′56″N 46°48′15″W / 44.48222°N 46.80417°W (Atlantic Ocean) | MOM Holotype [station 151] [fide Belloc (1950:3)] |
In design
The argonaut was the inspiration for a number of classical and modern art and decorative forms including use on pottery and architectural elements. Some early examples are found in Bronze Age
In literature and etymology
- Argonauts are featured in Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, noted for their ability to use their tentacles as sails, though this is a widespread myth.
- A female argonaut is also described in Marianne Moore's poem "The Paper Nautilus".
- "Argonauta" is the name of a chapter in Anne Morrow Lindbergh's Gift from the Sea.
- Paper nautiluses were caught in The Swiss Family Robinson novel.[24]
- Argonauts gave their name to an Arabidopsis thaliana mutation and by extension to Argonaute proteins.
References
- ^ Naef, A. (1923). "Die Cephalopoden, Systematik". Fauna Flora Golf. Napoli (35) (in German). 1: 1–863.
- ^ Scales, Helen (2015). Spirals in Time: The Secret Life and Curious Afterlife of Seashells. Bloomsbury.
- ^ "Word Origin and History for Argonaut". Online Etymology Dictionary. 2010. Retrieved 2017-11-15.
- ^ "Origin of nautilus". Dictionary.com Unabridged. 2017. Retrieved 2017-11-15.
- ^ Figuier, Louis (1869). The Ocean World: Being a Descriptive History of the Sea and Its Living Inhabitants. London: Cassell, Petter and Galpin. pp. 329.
- ^ Delle Chiaje, S. (1825). Memorie sulla storia e notomia degli animali (in Italian). Senza Vertebre del Regno di Napoli. I.
- ^ a b Nixon, M.; Young, J. Z. (2003). The Brains and Lives of Cephalopods. Oxford University Press. [page needed]
- S2CID 131373540.
- ^ PMID 20484241.
- ^ "Museum Victoria 'Argonaut buoyancy' video" Archived 2012-07-13 at the Wayback Machine museumvictoria.com.au. URL accessed on 19 May 2010.
- ^ Pidcock, R. 2010. Ancient octopus mystery resolved. BBC News, May 19, 2010.
- ^ Monks, N.; Palmer, C. P. (2002). Ammonites. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington D.C.
- ^ a b Pisor, D. L. (2005). Registry of World Record Size Shells (4th ed.). Snail's Pace Productions and ConchBooks. p. 12.
- ^ (in Russian) Nesis, K. N. 1982. Abridged key to the cephalopod mollusks of the world's ocean. Light and Food Industry Publishing House, Moscow, 385+ii pp. [Translated into English by B. S. Levitov, ed. by L. A. Burgess (1987), Cephalopods of the world. T. F. H. Publications, Neptune City, NJ, 351 pp.]
- ^ a b c Clarke, M. R. (1986). A Handbook for the Identification of Cephalopod Beaks. Oxford University Press. pp. 273 pp.
- ^ Banas, P. T.; D. E. Smith & D. C. Biggs (1982). "An association between a pelagic octopod, Argonauta sp. Linnaeus 1758, and aggregate salps". Fish. Bull. 80: 648–650.
- ^ Serge Gofas (2015). "Argonauta Linnaeus, 1758". World Register of Marine Species. Flanders Marine Institute. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
- ^ Ponzi, G. (1876). Cefalopodi. [p. 932 + pl. III 1a–b] In: I fossili del Monte Vaticano. Atti della Reale Accademia dei Lincei, series 2, 3(2): 925–959 + 3 pls. (in Italian)
- ^ Martill, D.M. & M.J. Barker (2006). A paper nautilus (Octopoda, Argonauta) from the Miocene Pakhna Formation of Cyprus. Palaeontology 49 (5): 1035-1041.
- ^ Sweeney, M. J. Taxa Associated with the Family Argonautidae Tryon, 1879. Tree of Life web project.
- ISBN 1-84171-165-9
- ^ C.Michael Hogan, Knossos Fieldnotes, The Modern Antiquarian (2007)
- ISBN 978-0-520-03601-7.
- ^ Johann David Wyss and Jenny H. Stickney, The Swiss Family Robinson, Ginn & Co., 1898, 364 pages.
External links
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/4/4a/Commons-logo.svg/30px-Commons-logo.svg.png)