Name:_______________________________________________
Porifera, Cnidaria and Ctenophora Lab
Directions: Each activity has specimens and reading material you must review. Read the instructions
for each activity carefully in order to make sure you have completed this lab correctly.
Activity 1-Porifera
1. Draw one of the sponge specimens available
in the box.
2. Label the ostia and osculum on your drawing.
3. What kind of symmetry does the sponge
display?
Activity 2-Porifera Body Plans
4. Color code the diagram of sponge anatomy below. Each feature /letter should be a different color.
5. How does the collar cell help the sponge filter feed?
Name:_______________________________________________
Porifera, Cnidaria and Ctenophora Lab
Activity 3- Cnidaria Body Plan
The phylum Cnidaria is a group of animals with a very simple functional body structure. The digestive
tract of the cnidarians lacks a second, or anal, opening and consists of only a mouth and a saclike cavity.
There are two basic cnidarians body forms: the medusa and the polyp. Fill in the table below for how
these to body forms compare:
POLYP
MEDUSA
6. Lifestyle
(free swimming or sessile)
7. Mouth facing
(up or down)
8. Symmetry
9. Groups
10. Label the body plans below as polyp or medusa
Activity 4- Phylum Cnidaria –Class Anthazoa
In contrast to anemones…coral are colonial polyps with an exoskeleton. This means that an individual
polyp cannot exist on its own and the entire colony is covered in continuous tissue. Each polyp sits in/on
a calcium carbonate skeleton that it has excreted and can retract into.
11. Draw one of the coral specimens available in
the box below.
12. What kind of symmetry does coral have?
13. Is it evident in the colony or only in an
individual?
Name:_______________________________________________
Porifera, Cnidaria and Ctenophora Lab
Activity 5 Phylum Cnidaria-Class Hydrozoa
Some Hydrazoans are colonial jellies like the Portoguese Man-o-War. These colonial hydras can also be
called siphonophores. These Cnidarians have a gas filled float used to sail across water while their
stinging tentacles trail behind them. Their body is made up of a colony of individuals that live, feed and
float together. While one individual feeds the rest are busy with defense or reproduction.
14. Draw a picture of the Portuguese-Man-War
available
15. How are they similar to “true jellies” or scyphazoa?
16. How are they different?
Activity 6 Phylum Cnidaria-Class Scyphozoa
Jellyfish were probably the first animals to swim in the water column. While part of the jellyfish’s life
cycle is a bottom dwelling asexual polyp, you are more familiar with the mobile planktonic and sexually
reproducing medusa. Aurelia is a common genus on the Jersey shore. It has very short tentacles because
it is a suspension feeder.
17. Sketch Aurelia and label with the following
terms: aboral, oral, tentacle, bell
18. How does a jellyfish’s shape help it eat?
(Hint remember the movie?)
Name:_______________________________________________
Porifera, Cnidaria and Ctenophora Lab
Activity 7 Phylum Cnidaria-Class Cubazoa
Article: Read the excerpt on Box Jellyfish to answer the questions…
19. What kind of sensory structure are found in this group?
20. How can you tell them apart from “true jellies”?
21.Where is this group found?
22.Why might you not want to meet one in person?
Activity 8- Phylum Ctenophora
23. Sketch the comb jelly specimen as per instructions
and then use the information in the box to answer the
questions below. Label its ciliary combs.
19.
cells?
24.How do these animals capture food without stinging
25. Why is it surprising that there are fossils of this animal group?
Name:_______________________________________________
Porifera, Cnidaria and Ctenophora Lab
Discussion Questions
26. Sponges are animals made up of an aggregate of (cells……tissues….organs ) that work together in the
absence of (cells……tissues….organs ).
27. How are all sponges similar? How are they different?
28. The phylum name Porifera literally means “ with pores” . Why is this name appropriate?
29. Why are sponges considered to be primitive animals?
30. Describe the body plans you observed in the Cnidaria group?
31. How did the change in Cnidaria body plan relate to a change in lifestyle?
32. Compare the comb jellies to true jellies
SIMILARITIES
DIFFERENCES
Name:_______________________________________________
Porifera, Cnidaria and Ctenophora Lab
Introduction to Ctenophora
Ctenophores (Greek for "comb-bearers") have eight "comb rows" of fused
cilia arranged along the sides of the animal, clearly visible along the red
lines in these pictures. These cilia beat synchronously and propel
ctenophores through the water. Some species move with a flapping
motion of their lobes or undulations of the body. Many ctenophores have
two long tentacles, but some lack tentacles completely.
Ctenophores, variously known as comb jellies, sea gooseberries, sea
walnuts, or Venus's girdles, are voracious predators. Unlike cnidarians,
with which they share several superficial similarities, they lack stinging
cells. Instead, in order to capture prey, ctenophores possess sticky cells
called colloblasts. In a few species, special cilia in the mouth are used for
biting gelatinous prey.
The phylogenetic position of ctenophores has been, and still is, in dispute. Ctenophores have a pair of anal pores,
which have sometimes been interpreted as homologous with the anus of bilaterian animals (worms, humans, snails,
fish, etc.). Furthermore, they possess a third tissue layer between the endoderm and ectoderm, another
characteristic reminiscent of the Bilateria. However, molecular data has contradicted this view, although only
weakly. Therefore, this is an active area of research.
Although most ctenophores swim, one group creeps along the
bottom of the seas. Most of these species live on other
animals, for instance with echinoderms, sponges, or benthic
cnidarians. Many ctenophores, like various other planktonic
organisms, are bioluminescent, able to give off light.
Until fairly recently, no fossil ctenophores were known. Like
most pelagic cnidarians, the bodies of ctenophores are made
up mostly of water, and the chances of leaving a recognizable
fossil are very slim. Two species of fossil ctenophore have now
been found in the Late Devonian, in the famous
Hunsrückscheifer slates of southern Germany (Stanley and
Stürmer, 1983, 1987). Both owe their preservation to rapid
precipitation of pyrite in the tissues, and both are quite
similar to living ctenophores in the order Cydippida (the "sea gooseberries.") Other ctenophore-like forms have
been found in the Cambrian-age Burgess Shale of the Canadian Rocky Mountains and Chengjiang Formation of
Southern China. These forms differ from living ctenophores in several ways, thus obscuring their phylogenetic
affinities.
Little is currently known about the basic biology of most ctenophores; indeed, the individual in these pictures has
not even yet been formally described and named, despite being large, spectacularly colored, and common. These
photographs were made available to the UCMP by Underwater World, Queensland, Australia.
View the World List of Ctenophora species, arranged in a taxonomic classification, or visit the page on Ctenophora
at the Tree of Life.
Sources:


Stanley, G.D., and W. Stürmer. 1983. The first fossil ctenophore from the Lower Devonian of West
Germany. Nature 303:518-520.
Stanley, G.D., and W. Stürmer. 1989. A new fossil ctenophore discovered by X-rays. Nature 327:61-63.
Name:_______________________________________________
Porifera, Cnidaria and Ctenophora Lab
Cubozoans are marvelous animals.
They look like your basic jellyfish, but they can swim pretty fast, maneuver around things,
and see fairly well despite not having a brain. Believe it or not.
In general, box jellies are similar in form to the "true" jellyfish, known as scyphozoans.
However, it is relatively easy to tell the two groups apart. Cubozoans have a square shape
when viewed from above. (Gee, maybe that's how they got their name.) They also have four
evenly spaced out tentacles or bunches of tentacles and well-developed eyes. Not
surprisingly, given their squishy nature, there are not many fossil cubozoans known.
Today, there are about 20 known species found in tropical and semitropical waters. The
Australian stinger Chironex fleckeri is among the deadliest creatures in the world, having
caused human fatalities.