Minor Phyla

phylum: Echiura
eg: Bonellia viridis

• Spoon worm,
• is a marine worm
• (Class Echiura, phylum Annelida) ---old
classification
• noted for displaying exceptional sexual
dimorphism
• and for the biocidal properties of a pigment in
its skin
 Distribution

• found in the north-eastern Atlantic Ocean and

the Mediterranean sea
 Description
• The pale- to dark-green female,
• with a 15 cm-long, round or sausage-shaped body,
• lives on the sea-floor at a depth of 10 to 100 metres,
• Habitat: concealed by burrowing in gravel or hiding in
rock crevasses or burrows abandoned by other animals.
• It has two anchoring hooks underneath its body and an
extensible feeding proboscis up to 10 times its body-
length.
• It is mainly a detritivore, feeding also on small animals.
• .
 male
• it has a flat, unpigmented body
• grows to only 1–3 mm,
• reproductive organs and devoid of other
structures;
• (it lives on or inside the body of a female)
• unique role in the worm's sexual differentiation.
• The planktonic, free-swimming Bonellia larvae are
initially sexually undifferentiated.
• Larvae which land on unoccupied sea-floor mature,
over the period of years, into adult females
• . Most larvae, however, come in contact with the
bonellin in the skin of an adult female—its body or its
roving, bonellin-rich proboscis
• —and are masculinised by this exposure.
• .
• The chemical causes these larvae to develop
into the tiny males, which cling to the female's
body or are sucked inside it by the feeding
tube, to spend the remainder of their lives
inside her genital sac, producing sperm to
fertilize her eggs, dependent on her for all
other needs
Phylum: Ectoprocta(Bryozoa), Bugula
• Kingdom: Animalia
• Phylum: Bryozoa
• Class: Gymnolaemata
• Order: Cheilostomata
• Family: Bugulidae
• Genus: Bugula
• often mistaken for seaweed.
• It commonly grows upright in bushy colonies
of up to 15 cm in height
• Common name: moss animals
• Marine
• Alimentary canal u shaped with mouth & anus
close to each other
• Reproduction: budding (asexual)
• Hermophrodite (sexual reproduction)
• Larvae: cyphonautautes/ coronate/
phylactolemate
• Bugula neritina attracted interest as a source
of cytotoxic chemicals, bryostatins, under
clinical investigation as anti-cancer agents.
 Distribution

• tropical and subtropical waters

• however it has become widespread globally
due to attachment to the hulls of vessels.
• It is considered an invasive species in some
countries
Phylum: phoronida (phoronis)
 Phylum:Phoronida

• Kingdom:Animalia
• Phylum:Phoronida
• Family:Phoronidae
• Genus:Phoronis
• It lives in a tube projecting from the sea floor
in shallow seas around the world
• constructs and lives in a rigid, chitinous tube
about 10 cm long, incorporating sand grains
and detritus.
• The extended worm is up to 19 centimetres
long but it can contract down to about one
fifth of this length
• The body is pinkish
• divided into two sections:
– mesosome and metasome
• The anterior part, the mesosome, has a cavity,
the mesocoel, that extends into the tentacles and
keeps them rigid by hydrostatic pressure.
• The mesosome bears the lophophore, a
specialist feeding structure which consists of a
ring of up to 190 translucent tentacles arranged
in a horseshoe-shape encircling the crescent-
shaped mouth
• The posterior and larger body section is the
metasome and contains the metacoel. It is
swollen at the base into an ampulla which
may provide grip inside the tube
• The body has two sections, each with its
own coelom.
• There is a specialist feeding structure,
the lophophore, which is an extension of the wall
of the coelom and is surrounded by tentacles.
• The gut is U-shaped.
• The diagnostic feature that distinguishes this
genus is the lack of epidermal invagination at the
base of the lophophore.
• These worms are filter feeders.
• Its larva is an Actinotrocha.
• The gut is U-shaped and extends from the
mouth to the ampulla before doubling back to
the anus which is situated just below the
mouth.
• The gonads are located in the metacoel