Reptantia is a clade of Decapoda named in 1880 which includes , and many other well-known crustaceans.
Classification
In older classifications, Reptantia was one of the two
of
Decapoda alongside
Natantia, with Reptantia containing the walking forms, and Natantia containing the swimming forms (
,
shrimp and
boxer shrimp). However, in 1963 Martin Burkenroad found
Natantia to be
paraphyletic and invalid, and instead split Decapoda into the two suborders of
Dendrobranchiata (prawns) and
Pleocyemata. Pleocyemata contains all the members of the Reptantia (including crabs, lobsters, crayfish, and others), as well as the
Stenopodidea ("boxer shrimp"), and
Caridea (true shrimp).
Reptantia remains a valid
monophyletic grouping, but is now no longer ranked as a suborder.
Anatomy
The name Reptantia means "those that walk", and contains those
Decapoda whose primary mode of locomotion is to walk along a surface using the
rather than swimming through the water with the
pleopods. Despite this, many reptants are able to propel themselves through the water, and many non-reptants can and will walk.
Systematics
The
cladogram below shows Reptantia under the sub-order
Pleocyemata within the larger order
Decapoda, from analysis by Wolfe
et al., 2019.
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]
Reptantia comprises the following :