Calliactis
Encyclopedia
Calliactis is a genus
of sea anemone
s. Species in this genus are mutually symbiotic
with hermit crabs. The anemone gets a place to live and discarded scraps of the crab's food in exchange for its help in defending the crab.
Genus
In biology, a genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms, which is an example of definition by genus and differentia...
of sea anemone
Sea anemone
Sea anemones are a group of water-dwelling, predatory animals of the order Actiniaria; they are named after the anemone, a terrestrial flower. Sea anemones are classified in the phylum Cnidaria, class Anthozoa, subclass Zoantharia. Anthozoa often have large polyps that allow for digestion of larger...
s. Species in this genus are mutually symbiotic
Symbiosis
Symbiosis is close and often long-term interaction between different biological species. In 1877 Bennett used the word symbiosis to describe the mutualistic relationship in lichens...
with hermit crabs. The anemone gets a place to live and discarded scraps of the crab's food in exchange for its help in defending the crab.
Species
Species within the genus include:- Calliactis algoaensis
- Calliactis androgyna
- Calliactis annulata
- Calliactis argentacoloratus
- Calliactis brevicornis
- Calliactis conchicola
- Calliactis japonica
- Calliactis parasiticaCalliactis parasiticaCalliactis parasitica is a species of sea anemone associated with hermit crabs. It lives in the eastern Atlantic Ocean and Mediterranean Sea at depths between the intertidal zone and . It is up to in size, with up to 700 tentacles, and is very variable in colour. The relationship between C...
- Calliactis polypores
- Calliactis polypusCalliactis polypusCalliactis polypus is a species of sea anemone in the family Hormathiidae. It is usually found living on the surface of a sea snail shell in which a hermit crab is living.-Description:...
- Calliactis reticulata
- Calliactis sinensis
- Calliactis tricolor
- Calliactis valdiviae
- Calliactis variegata
- Calliactis vincentina
- Calliactis xishaensis