Slipper Lobster

October 30, 2012

Slipper lobster photographed during a night dive at Pulau Hantu. PHOTO: Debby Ng/Hantu Bloggers

Slipper lobsters are a family of decapod crustaceans found in all warm oceans and seas. Despite their name, they are not true lobsters, but are more closely related to spiny lobsters and furry lobsters. Slipper lobsters are instantly recognisable by their enlarged antennae, which project forward from the head as wide plates.

Slipper lobsters are typically bottom dwellers of the continental shelves, found at depths of up to 500 metres (1,600 ft). Slipper lobsters eat a variety of molluscs, including limpets, mussels and oysters, as well as crustaceans, polychaetes and echinoderms. They grow slowly and live to a considerable age. They lack the giant neurones which allow other decapod crustaceans to perform tailflips, and must rely on other means to escape predator attack, such as burial in a substrate and reliance on the heavily armoured exoskeleton.

Slipper lobsters have six segments in their heads and eight segments in the thorax, which are collectively covered in a thick carapace. The six segments of the abdomen each bear a pair of pleopods, while the thoracic appendages are either walking legs or maxillipeds. The head segments bear various mouthparts and two pairs of antennae. The first antennae, or antennules, are held on a long flexible stalk, and are used for sensing the environment. The second antennae are the slipper lobsters’ most conspicuous feature, as they are expanded and flattened into large plates that extend horizontally forward from the animal’s head.

There is considerable variation in size among species of slipper lobsters. The Mediterranean species Scyllarus pygmaeus is the smallest, growing to a maximum total length of 55 millimetres (2.2 in), and rarely more than 40 mm (1.6 in). The largest species , Scyllarides haanii, may reach 50 centimetres (20 in) long.[1] Scyllarides haanii species is distributed in the Indo-West Pacific region from the Red Sea and the western Indian Ocean (Mauritius), to Japan (Sagami Bay), Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Republic of Korea, China, Taiwan, Indonesia, Hawaii, Australia (New South Wales, Queensland, West Australia), and New Zealand. This species is likely to have a larger distribution than is currently known. [2]

The most significant predators of slipper lobsters are bony fish.

Posted in Biology