In a hole in a tunicate there lived a hobbit: New shrimp species named after Bilbo Baggins

(Pensoft Publishers) A new species of shrimp was named after Tolkien's Bilbo Baggins thanks to its small size and hairy feet. The new species, Odontonia bagginsi, was described, figured and named together with another new species: Odontonia plurellicola. Both shrimps live symbiotically inside tunicates collected around Ternate and Tidore, Indonesia. In the present study, published in the open access journal ZooKeys, anatomical and genetic characters were used to place the new species in the tree of life.
Source: EurekAlert! - Medicine and Health - Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: news