a shelled animal with tails sticking out the back
A class of crustaceans, with the body typically enclosed within a bivalved carapace
A small, seed-shaped animal with two shells. Ostracods live in water.
Small, active, mostly freshwater crustaceans having a carapace covering and seven pairs of appendages; of the Subclass Ostracoda
(pronounced OS-tra-KOD) Ostracod ( meaning "shell like") are also called seed shrimp or mussel shrimp. These tiny freshwater and marine crustaceans belong to the subclass Ostracoda. They are scavenger that have a shrimp-like body plus two hard shells connected by a hinge; they have one or two appendages. Ostracods range in size from micoscopic to about an inch (2.5 cm) long. There are about 20,000 species of living ostracods and many more extinct species. These very common animals are used as index fossils, helping to date rock layers. The oldest-known ostracods are from the Cambrian period; they became widespread during the Ordovician and remain so.
Ostracoda is a class of the Crustacea, sometimes known as the seed shrimp because of their appearance. Some 50,000 extinct and extant species have been identified, grouped into several orders.