Native to the waters of the Indo-Pacific from East Africa to Guam, this is a creature to behold. The peacock mantis shrimp is biologically known as Odontodactylus sycallarus usually identified for its bright colours. The ‘shrimp’ is most notably known for its powerful punch and amazing vision. They can grow anywhere from 3 to 18 cm (1.2 to 7.1 in) in length. They are basically burrowers and they dig their holes on the seafloor in close proximity to coral reefs. These little critters are predators and mostly prefer crustaceans, bivalves and gastropods. How does it kill prey? By repeatedly smashing them with a special club until they cave. Yes you read that right.
Mantis Smash!!!
The Mantis Shrimp have specially modified appendages designed to crack shell. They are club shaped and hardened specially to withstand the force of the blows they dish out. Any human who has gotten into a fist fight knows that punching someone hurts a lot. And human punches are normally around 40km/h(25 mph). However, the Mantis Shrimp punches at an excess of over 80km/h(50 mph) with an acceleration comparable to that of a .22 caliber bullet dishing out around 1500 Newtons of force (340 pounds-force). Its punch is so fast that it boils the surrounding water on impact with its target stunning it. This punch is legendary, so to speak, in the animal kingdom and is the fastest punch on record for any living animal. For this reason, they have been known to crack aquariums with glass walls and the shells of any creature unfortunate enough to become its prey.
The Award to Best Eyes Goes to…..
Looking closely at the mantis shrimp, we notice that the creature has two eyes on stalks protruding from its ‘head’. These eyes are, well, remarkable. Each is divided into three sections, giving each eye a sort of ‘trinocular’ vision. Apart from that, the eyes of the Mantis Shrimp have twelve different colour processing cells and as a result are able to see in twelve different colours! By contrast, humans can see in three and eagles in five. Apart from the crazy ability to see in high definition, their eyes can see UV light and circularly polarized light! To date no other visual system in the animal kingdom has come close to that of the peacock mantis shrimp.
image source: sciencenewsforstudent.org
So imagine you have a psychotic hunter, with a killer punch and wonderful eyesight that seeks to make you dinner (not to say that the critter’s psychotic)…… now you probably know how that lobster feels.
Imagesource: untamedscience.com
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