Dikerogammarus villosus, an AMPHIPOD! Photo by Michael Grabowski, whose watermark the journalist kindly cropped out in the article.
Brave readers, science-enthusiasts and naturophiles all, I dare you to look upon
this terrible news article about an invasive amphipod crustacean in the UK. Look upon it and despair! Behold, a Gammarid Amphipod referred to as a shrimp, a decapod, and a fish – all within the space of about a hundred words. Cower in fear as the amphipod is referred to in scare quotes as, “the Killer Shrimp”. Thrill that this monstrous 3 to 30 mm animal predates other creatures “simply for the bloodlust” and is a “cannibal” since it eats other arthropods; their “shrimpy kin”.
Christ, he hits almost every point of Martin Robbins’ brilliant spoof of bad science writing.
The author extolls:
What an animal!
Emphasis his own: As if to say, “Woah, crustaceans are actually animals!”
Oh look, it’s lunch time. I think I will go cannibalize a chicken sandwich.
I think we have a winner, getting fish and crustaceans mixed up scores a 131 on the Taxonomy Fail Index
(BTW, I have to admit to telling undergrads that they could call gammarids we’d collected for their project on Wolbachia “lawn shrimp” which is sort of a taxonomy fall)
http://sciblogs.co.nz/the-atavism
Shrimp is the closest of the three taxonomy fails in the article; purely because it is such a nebulous classification. Practically every crustacean that isn’t a crab or lobster is considered a “shrimp” in the common vernacular:
Mysids
Decapod shrimp
Euphausiids
Amphipods
Stomatopods
Branchiopods
Copepods
“The gammarid or “killer shrimp” has no heart, and joyfully eats its own.”
I wonder if the author means “heart” in the metaphorical sense. I’d like to give her the benefit of the doubt, but it’s not that weird (for those unfamiliar with biology) to think that invertebrates don’t have this organ or that.
http://www.cephalove.southernfriedscience.com
I was going to bring that up as well, but brevity required that I not discuss every silly thing the article said. I think the author really thinks they don’t have a heart organ. I think he would have said, “heartless” otherwise.
I’d say I’m shocked, but I cancelled my subscription to Science after reading one of their ‘news’ articles on an evil, invasive ‘mollusk’ called the green crab. I suppose I could give ‘fish’ a pass here, one could call an amphipod a shellfish and in New South Wales you need a fishing permit to take dragonflies, but a decapod!
PS – Dave Rentz at Bunyip blog has some pictures of a strange emesine reduviid:
http://bunyipco.blogspot.com/2010/09/entomological-oddities.html
as well as a few other entomological oddities.
http://homebuggarden.blogspot.com/