Brachioteuthid SEMs

[Tintenfisch]

One of my current projects is the New Zealand brachioteuthid fauna, so I've been over playing with the SEM again. Here are some of the nicer pics from this week's sessions so far - all Brachioteuthis sp. indet. for the moment. Upper left: arm sucker ring; upper right & lower left: tentacular suckers (different species); lower right: paralarval tentacle club.

[DWhatley]

Is the tentacle normal? The helter-skelter look of the suckers seems odd. I know mother nature does not keep things in perfect semetry but ...

[cuttlegirl]

It's probably an artifact of preparing the tentacle for the SEM.

[Tintenfisch]

Actually, in the central part of the club in Brachioteuthidae (http://tolweb.org/Brachioteuthidae/19409), it is quite difficult to identify longitudinal or horizontal rows - toward the outer edges they're clear, but in the middle they do kind of just look like a big jumble, especially when they're just forming (as in that paralarva). Here are two more shots of adjacent regions on the club of a slightly larger paralarva - in the proximal region, the suckers are already well formed, but they're just sprouting in the mid-region.

[DWhatley]

Do you know if they loose some of the suction cups as they develop? I looks like there are way too many in the jumble to ever all be part of the normal looking rows.

[Tintenfisch]

They may lose some - but some species have that many (or nearly that many) as adults, too. The one in the photo on TOL is almost certainly not the same species as the little club above.