Friday 21 August 2015

Creature 325: Enteroxenos



Who needs a body?
Enteroxenos is a parasite which specializes on the digestive tract of sea cucumbers.

You may be looking at it and thinking that it is some kind of roundworm, but it's actually a snail. The juveniles look like normal snails but after they infect their host they start to lose all their unnecessary body parts like the shell, digestive tract,  sensory organs etc...


Their reproductive track is the only part that actually grows. After they infect their host. They absorb nutrients through their skin so they don't need a mouth. The females are much larger than the males and after a while the male just infects the female body to save time trying to find mates.

Distribution:
Enteroxenos can be found in the North Atlantic.

Classification:
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Mollusca
Class: Gastropoda
Order: Caenogastropoda
Family: Eulimidae
Genus: Enteroxenos

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