Sea-Monkeys, the easiest and cheapest pets you had growing up. Either you had them, knew someone who had them, or watched that one episodes from The Rugrats where Tommy and Chuckie tried to set theirs free. All you had to do was pick them up at a Target or Walmart and add water, and bam 24 hours later you had some new little creatures to call your own. Although, since these tiny friends were instantly there once you added some water and patience, it was always magical as a child to understand how they just came to be. The question being what were these things swimming around?
http://www.benjamin-toys.com/ori-pic/6746.jpg
These cute little creatures that helped teach us responsibility are not actual monkeys, go figure, but actually a species of brine shrimp known as Artemia salina. Discovered and marketed by scientist Harold von Braunhut, he “observed their eggs have a long shelf life out of water, and, once hatched, they’re pretty easy to care for,” according to USATODAY.com.
Sea-Monkeys “are derived from crustaceans that undergo “cryptobiosis,” meaning they can enter a state of suspended animation in times of adverse environmental conditions, and stay in that state indefinitely, until conditions improve,” says livescience.com, so they basically sit in their plastic bags and wait until their conditions improve. By improvements meaning a child takes the dried shrimp and adds water. The shrimp obtained their name due to that when they do reached “improved conditions”, their tails resemble that of a monkey’s.
As for the anatomy of the creatures, they obviously don’t appear as they do on the packaging. They aren’t animated part fish/human/mermaid/thing as advertised. In reality, they are tiny little clear shrimp no bigger than the size of the end of a pencil. They breathe through their feet and also have a thirds eye that they happen to lose as they approach Sea-Monkey adulthood. Sea-Monkeys probably appeal to kids probably because not only are they a low maintenance pet, but they also they are these animals that teach them how to care for something and take care of it.
http://savetheriver.us/wp-content/uploads/sea-monkey-closeup.jpg
Work Cited
http://mentalfloss.com/article/56755/16-amazing-facts-about-sea-monkeys
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/life/columnist/popcandy/2003-07-15-pop-candy_x.htm
http://www.livescience.com/33907-sea-monkeys.html
http://animals.howstuffworks.com/marine-life/question191.htm