What are Phoronids?
Phoronids, common name horseshoe worms, are a little-known phylum of marine worms that look like small delicate flowers on the ocean floor. Phoronids are lophophorates, like brachiopods (an ancient group superficially similar to clams) and bryozoans (“moss animals”), to which they are related. Lophophorates, including phoronids, feed using a lophophore, a ciliated organ located outside the mouth. Phoronids are different enough from other animals that they are considered a distinct phylum, one that includes just 30 species. Like other lophophorates, phoronids are stationary animals. They burrow tubes into the ocean floor in which they conceal most of their worm-shaped bodies, while their fanned lophophore sticks above the surface. The adults surround themselves with a chitinous tube, secreted using specialized cells. Rare among animals, the phoronids’ anus and mouth are at the same end of the body, both near the top. This is necessary, otherwise the phoronid would have nowhere to expel
