strange shrimp

A silly creature from the Cambrian Period (which is about 538.8 to 486.85 million years ago), specfically the Early to Middle Cambrian. They were the one of the apex predators of the time because of their size which was up to 37cm.

The front mouth-like appendages are speculated to be used to grab prey. They extend and contract much like fingers. Originally, it was thought that they consumed hardbodied critters. However, there is no strong evidence for this other than misidentified bite marks on trilobites. Those bite marks came from a different species that somewhat resembles the anomalocaris, peytoia. If they were to go after hardbodied animals, it might have damaged their mouthparts. Instead, it is thought that they would hunt softbodied animals.

To swim, they ungulate their overlapping side fins. This would have made them "glide" through the water seamlessly. This wasn't a complicated way of swimming, so it can be inferred that they had simple brains. Of course, you wouldn't expect complicated brains in a time period where complex life itself was newish.

Anomalocaris had compound eyes similar to dragonflies. This means that they could have had the most advanced eyes of any species in the Cambrian. The evidence of particular light sensitive proteins suggests that those eyes may have had dichromatic color vision which is two-color vision.

I can't recall when I first discovered that these silly guys had existed. I know I didn't find them from the tribute to anomalocaris video. I highly recommend that work of art btw and a video interviewing the guy who made the tribute video.

I love these guys so much that I tattooed one on myself. He lives on my left calf, and someday, I'll shade him. When that's healed, I'll show him to the world