Siphonophore

The Siphonophores are an order of cnidarian invertebrates in the class Hydrozoa. The Portuguese man o' war is an example.

Marrus orthocanna is a species of pelagic siphonophore, a colonial animal. It has zooids, some of which are polyps and some medusae.
It lives in the Arctic and other cold, deep waters, swimming independently in mid-ocean.

A siphonophore is not a single animal. It is a colony of four kinds of zooids. Zooids are very small, highly modified individuals. All the zooids in a colony are genetically identical. These zooids are specialized polyps and medusoids.

Though structurally similar to other cnidarians, the zooids do not live by themselves: they are attached to each other. Each type of zooid is not self-sufficient. It depends for survival on the others doing what it cannot do by itself.

So close do the zooids fit together that the colony looks like a single individual. It was a triumph of 19th century biology to discover the real nature of the siphonophores.

• Bathyphysa conifera
• Portuguese man o' war