Latreille, 1817
Adult members of the eumalacostracan Order Stomatopoda are crustaceans with a well developed laterally expanded carapace that covers the cephalon (head) except for the acron and antennular somite, and that is fused to the first four of the eight thoracomeres. The body is divided in three tagmata: cephalon (head), thorax and abdomen. The relative thick and robust abdomen has six somites, excluding the telson. The telson is well developed and usually well armed; occasionally the telson is fused with the sixth abdominal somite forming a pleotelson.
The eyes are stalked, compound and occasionally reduced.
Maxillipeds are absent. All eight thoracic somites bear a pair of appendages, of which the first five are subchelate and the second is modified as a powerful raptorial claw; all first five thoracopods are involved in feeding, the remaining three thoracopods are biramous and used in locomotion.
The first five of the six abdominal somites bear all biramous and laminar pleopods, often provided with gills; the sixth abdominal somite bears the biramous uropods.
Larval development is anamorphic; the larvae hatch as antizoea or pseudozoas and then go through several pelagic substages before becoming adult and settling for a benthic life. (See also Crustacean larval stages).
Ecology
Adult stomatopods are bottom-living, the larvae are planktonic. Stomatopoda are usually marine and inhabit mostly shallow waters of tropical and subtropical, sometimes temperate seas.
Distribution in the North Sea
Two species are known from the area, of which the larval stages occur in the plankton:
Family Squillidae
Rissoides desmaresti
Family Nannosquillidae
Platysquilla eusebia
[After McLaughlin, 1980; Brusca and Brusca, 1990]