Fish Amphibians and Reptiles Phylum Chordate all have

Fish, Amphibians and Reptiles

Phylum: Chordate – all have spinal cords • Subphylum: Vertebrates – all have a spinal cord held within a bony spinal back bone • Classes are: Jawless Cartilage, and Bony Fish

Fish characteristics – all fish have All fish have notochords these: (they are used for support but are eventually replaced by back bones)

• All have nerve cords • All have two chamber hearts. • All live in the water, are aquatic. Except mudskippers! And more mudskippers. • All are cold blooded Exterior view Click on heart to see HUMAN heart circulation Interior View

All have gill slits to breathe

Gills – feathery organs for gas exchange

Three Classes of Fish (In the Phylum Chordate)

Jawless Fish • No Jaw – use suction cups to eat • No paired fins • No Scales • Endoskeleton is all cartilage • Has a notochord for all its life • Examples: Hagfish and lamprey

Cartilage Fish Shark video • Endoskeleton is all cartilage • First fish type to have jaws, scales and paired fins Manta Ray – video – click on picture

Sharks • Have rows of teeth • Most are meat eaters • Keen sense of smell

Rays • Large paired fins extend on body sides like wings • Live near the ocean floor • Feed on small fish, mollusks, and crustaceans, and croc hunters

• • • Boney Fish Largest class of fish Huge variety Scales and paired fish Both fresh and salt water Gills have gill covers to increase water flow Lateral line – detects vibrations Nostrils – odor sensitive/better than sight Air bladder – (swim bladder) regulated swim depth Tail called caudal fin

Scales – physical protection

Fish reproduce by spawning • Usually external fertilization Blue gill spawning bed

Boney Fish Gallery • Creatures of the Deep • Seahorse • African Cichlids Clown Fish Trout Small mouth bass Blue Marlin

Fish Gallery, con’t Salmon spawning Northern Pike Sunfish Butterfly fish

Fabulous Fish Videos

Amphibians (Class)

Amphibian – means double life TWO Orders: Tailess: Frog toad Tailed: salamander newt

Poison Dart Frogs

Salamanders Mud puppy

All have a three chambered heart

Breathing – Use their thin, moist skin to breathe in water or land too – Also use simple lungs to breathe on land

Hibernate in Winter • Frogs hibernate in the Winter • Frogs estivate in the Summer • Frogs are COLD blooded!!

Metamorphosis

TWO Orders • TAILess – Frogs and Toads • TAILed – Newts and Salamanders

Reptiles

Cute!

General Characteristics Ectotherms (cold blooded) Lay water-tight, leathery eggs on land or give birth to live young Internal fertilization

General Characteristics, con’t – No metamorphosis – Breathe with lungs entire life – Three chambered heart

– Most have four legs (except snakes) – Most have claws – to dig, climb and run – Scales prevent drying out and injuries

Reptiles -4 orders

Reptiles-Snakes

Snake Characteristics have no ears (tympanic membrane instead) use tongues for “smelling” tongue picks up chemicals from the air and transfers them to a sensing organ (Jacobs organ) in the roof of the mouth

Pit vipers and some pythons, have heatsensitive pits on their face Some snakes inject venom into the prey through hollow fangs

They molt when they grow Non moveable eye lids

Largest - Anaconda Most poisonous in world – sea snake Flying SNAKES!!! Most poisonous in U. S. – coral snake

Lizards Basilisk Lizard Frilled lizard

Examples: iguana, gecko, skink, chameleon

Can release it’s tail to escape Some have long, sticky tongue for capturing food Moveable eye lids

Largest – Komodo Dragon Gila Monster - poisonous

Alligators and Crocodiles

Characteristics – eat any type of animal or canabalize also – can live for up to 100 years – called last living dinosaur – temperature of egg, determines the sex of offspring – lay about 50 eggs

• alligators may have 80 teeth and average 6 to 14 feet but may get up to 19 ft long • swallow prey hole • Crocodiles can reach 6 meters often • crocodiles have survived for over 200 million years • crocks have narrower snout than alligator

• crocks can stay under water for up to 2 hours • most live in shallow water • only reptile with a 4 chambered heart Here's what a crocodile heart looks like. Look at all that plumbing! It has a few features that we don't have, that I'll get to in a moment, and that are special adaptations for the life of an ectothermic, diving ambush predator.

Turtles and Tortoises

• have two hard boney shells • land water types • have no teeth

• use beak to feed • endangered due to soups and jewelry • eat worms, fish and insects, some are also herbivores • some can completely hide inside their shells

More feeding

• some swim faster than you can run • turtle more dependent on water environment, tortoise is land dweller only.