Spoon Worm

The spoon worm is a cylindrical, unsegmented marine worm that burrows in seafloor sediment, most commonly in shallow coastal waters of the northwest Pacific, though its wider family lives at depths exceeding 3,000 meters. Despite belonging to the annelid worms, it has lost the segmented body plan typical of the group, and it feeds by extending a broad, scoop-shaped, non-retractable proboscis to gather organic particles from the mud around its burrow. It is one of the most economically significant echiurans, harvested and eaten as food across parts of East Asia.