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PROTEUS (Proteus anguinus)

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Originally appearing in Volume V22, Page 475 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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PROTEUS (Proteus anguinus) , in See also:zoology, a See also:blind perennibranchiate tailed Batrachian, inhabiting the subterranean See also:waters of the See also:limestone caves to the See also:east of the Adriatic from See also:Carniola to Herzegovina. It was See also:long supposed to be the See also:sole representative of the Batrachians in the See also:cave See also:fauna, but other examples have been added in See also:recent years. It is a small See also:eel-like See also:animal, with See also:minute limbs, the anterior of which are tridactyle, the posterior didactyle, with a strongly compressed tail, a narrow See also:head, with See also:flat truncate snout, minute rudimentary eyes hidden under the skin, which is usually colourless, or rather flesh-coloured, with the See also:short, plume-like See also:external gills See also:blood-red; the jaws and See also:palate are toothed. This extraordinary Batrachian has been found in a See also:great number of different caves, but rather sporadically, and it is believed'that its real See also:home is in deeper subterranean waters, whence it is expelled ia,t times of floods. It is often kept in aquariums, where it may turn almost See also:black, and has bred in captivity. Proteus forms with Necturus (Menobranchus) the See also:family Proteidae. The second genus, which is widely distributed in eastern See also:North See also:America, is more generalized in its structure, having better See also:developed limbs, with four digits, and is adapted to live in the See also:light. But the two are closely allied, and Necturus gives us a very exact See also:idea of what sort of a type Proteus must be derived from. In 1896 a Proteus-like Batrachian was discovered in See also:Texas during the operation of tooling an artesian well 188 ft. deep, when+it was shot out with a number of remarkable and unknown Crustaceans. Typhlomolge rathbuni (see fig.), as this creature was called, agrees with Proteus in the shape of the head, in the See also:absence of functional eyes, in the presence of external gills, and in the unpigmented skin. It differs in the very short See also:body and the long slender limbs with four to five digits. It was first placed in the same family as Proteus, but the anatomical investigations of Ellen J.

See also:

Emerson have led this author to believe that the real See also:affinities are with. the larval See also:form of the lungless See also:salamander Spelerpes, not with Necturus and Proteus. Whilst Proteus has lungs in addition to the gills, Typhlomolge lacks the lungs, and with them the trachea and larnyx. It is therefore probable that Typhlomolge is a permanent larva derived from Spelerpes, whilst we are quite unable to assign any See also:direct ancestor to Necturus. Another blind Urodele has recently been described as Typhlotriton spelaeus, from caves in the See also:Mississippi Valley. It has neither gills nor lungs in the adult, and is found under rocks in or out of the See also:water. It is not allied to Proteus. The eyes are apparently normal in the larva, but in the adult they have undergone marked degeneration. See P. Configliachi and M. Rusconi, Del Prate() anguino (See also:Pavia, 1819), 4.; J. de Beclriaga, Lurchfauna Europas (1897), ii. 28; E. See also:Zeller, Uber See also:die Fortpflanzung See also:des Proteus anguinus., Jahresb. ver.

Nat. Wiirttemb. (1889), p. 131 ; L. Steineger, " New Genus and See also:

Species of Blind Cave Salamanders from North America," P.U.S. Nat. See also:Mus. (1892), xv. 115; idem, " New Genus and Species of Blind, Tailed Batrachians from the Subterranean Waters of Texas," op. cit. (1896), xviii. 619; Ellen J. Emerson, " See also:General See also:Anatomy of Typhlomolge rathbuni," Pi See also:Boston See also:Soc.

N.H. (1905), xxxii. 43.

End of Article: PROTEUS (Proteus anguinus)

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