Though my muse is antsy to unfurl the long lineage of my own species, and our arrival to the web of rivers and streamlets that crawl across the state of Maine, there are some scientific details that should not be passed over.
Just as one would be remiss and unimaginative to assume that a crayfish cannot blog, accordingly I would not presume that my kind reader is familiar with all the fine points of crayfishdom. It may be that in certain remote districts, and perhaps on alien worlds, "decapoda" and "astacidea" are not household words. If you, dear friend, hail from such a district, you might find the following text most informative.
At the risk of being arthropo-centric: we live in a world ruled by arthropods.
Arthropods are those "jointed foot" creatures--like insects, spiders, mites, and lobsters--and we are more numerous than any other phylum of animals. Our multifarious ranks outnumber all the birds, mammals, fish, reptiles, aye, all the backboned creatures combined.
Among the arthropods are my closer brethren, the crustaceans. We mostly populate aquatic environments, and we often can be recognized by our exoskeletal shells, which we periodically molt, as I have heretofore related.
Even more akin to myself are the ten-legged decapods--lobsters, crabs, shrimps, and prawns. Within this group we come to the astacidea and the astacoidea, which is where I shall close this taxonomic lesson. One could wax on indefinitely, with over one million species of arthropods and countless ranks. Instead, I shall sum up with the words of a favorite screenwrite: "It's a bug planet!"
Copepods: some of my arthropod/crustacean brethren.
Just as one would be remiss and unimaginative to assume that a crayfish cannot blog, accordingly I would not presume that my kind reader is familiar with all the fine points of crayfishdom. It may be that in certain remote districts, and perhaps on alien worlds, "decapoda" and "astacidea" are not household words. If you, dear friend, hail from such a district, you might find the following text most informative.
At the risk of being arthropo-centric: we live in a world ruled by arthropods.
Arthropods are those "jointed foot" creatures--like insects, spiders, mites, and lobsters--and we are more numerous than any other phylum of animals. Our multifarious ranks outnumber all the birds, mammals, fish, reptiles, aye, all the backboned creatures combined.
Among the arthropods are my closer brethren, the crustaceans. We mostly populate aquatic environments, and we often can be recognized by our exoskeletal shells, which we periodically molt, as I have heretofore related.
Even more akin to myself are the ten-legged decapods--lobsters, crabs, shrimps, and prawns. Within this group we come to the astacidea and the astacoidea, which is where I shall close this taxonomic lesson. One could wax on indefinitely, with over one million species of arthropods and countless ranks. Instead, I shall sum up with the words of a favorite screenwrite: "It's a bug planet!"
Copepods: some of my arthropod/crustacean brethren.
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