cryptostomy

An adaptation in which the mouth is reduced to a slit and its location is concealed.

Noun

  1. An adaptation in which the mouth is reduced to a slit and its location is concealed.
    • They are comparatively large, without outgrowths, of a rounded shape, with a flattened ventral surface and cryptostomy or plagiostomy with a lip. - 1991, Biology Bulletin of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, page 279:
    • The slit-like pseudostome is hidden by the dorsal lip and an extension of the ventral shell wall (cryptostomy). - 2000, John J. Lee, Gordon F. Leedale, Phyllis Clarke Bradbury, An illustrated guide to the protozoa:
    • Two other morphological features, plagiostomy and cryptostomy, are considered to be adaptations to life in soil; both involve a reduction in the size of the pseudostome in proportion to the test and the formation of a...

Origin

From crypto- + stoma + -y.