Card #094 · Invertebrates
Peacock mantis shrimp
Odontodactylus scyllarus
Common NE · Not Evaluated
Field notes
- Classification
- Order Stomatopoda · Family Odontodactylidae
- Range
- Indo-Pacific coral reefs
- Size
- 3–18 cm (1–7 in)
- Weight
- ~30–100 g (1–3.5 oz)
- Lifespan
- ~3–6 yrs
- Diet
- Carnivore
Most Notable
It throws one of the fastest punches in nature. A spring-loaded club snaps out like a bullet, hitting so hard the water flashes into boiling bubbles that can shatter a snail's shell or crack aquarium glass.
Its eyes may be the most complex in the animal kingdom. Each moves on its own and carries up to a dozen kinds of color receptor, where we have three, and it can see ultraviolet light and even the spiral twist of circularly polarized light, which no other animal is known to detect.
The two clubs fold like a jackknife and fire off a latch, storing and releasing energy far faster than muscle alone could, the same trick a crossbow uses.
The female in this photo is cradling a bright pink mass of thousands of eggs in her front limbs, cleaning and turning them until they hatch.
Only a few centimetres long, it lives hidden in a burrow among coral rubble, its shifting greens, reds, and blues making it one of the most colorful animals on the reef.
Range: Coral reefs across the tropical Indo-Pacific.