﻿6 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 59 



FOOD-GETTING 



The investigation of the method by which Emerita obtains its food 

 forms the main part of the present work and has furnished the most 

 important results. As far as the literature examined by the writers 

 is concerned, there appears to be little mention of food, and the specu- 

 lations concerning the organs which are used in feeding show how far 

 pure morphology may go astray. In the paper of Smith's already 

 mentioned, he says, " The mouth parts of the adult are not adapted for 

 ordinary prehension or mastication, but I am unable to make any 

 positive statement in regard to the food of these animals. In all 

 specimens examined the alimentary canal was filled with fine sand 

 which seemed to be nearly free from animal or vegetable matter. The 

 material from the stomach, however, shew, under the microscope, a 

 small quantity of vegetable matter, and it seems probable that the sand 

 is swallowed for the nutritive matter it may contain ". 9 In regard to 

 the antennae, the chief organs in feeding, he says, " Judging from the 

 peculiarly armed setae of the flagella, one of the principal offices of 

 the antennae is the removal of parasitic growths and all other foreign 

 substances from the appendages of the anterior portion of the 

 animal ". 10 These meager notes are all the data that we have been 

 able to find. 



Under normal conditions, on the part of the beach left uncovered 

 by the receding wave, the animals will often be found, if they have 

 not been disturbed by the observer's footsteps, facing the sea with the 

 rostrum just below the surface of the sand, while the stalked eyes and 

 the antennules project slightly. If one stands in the midst of a bed 

 while the wave sweeps over it, he will see little change at first, but as 

 soon as the water begins to run down the beach, the crustaceans will 

 thrust out their antennae, normally hidden beneath the external mouth 

 parts, and hold them directed forward and laterally with the tips 

 curved outward. Here the antennae remain, except for one or two 

 momentary infoldings, until the last film of water has drained off, 

 when they are again coiled beneath the mouth parts. 



The water running past the antennas forms, on the beach, the char- 

 acteristic V-shaped marks, already mentioned, by means of which the 

 presence and extent of a bed may often be clearly made out at a con- 

 siderable distance. 



Trans. Conn. Acad., Vol. 3, p. 313. 1877. 

 a Loc. cit. 



