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In terrestrial vertebrates, digitigrade (/ ˈ d ɪ dʒ ɪ t ɪ ˌ ɡ r eɪ d /) [1] locomotion is walking or running on the toes (from the Latin digitus, 'finger', and gradior, 'walk'). A digitigrade animal is one that stands or walks with its toes (phalanges) on the ground, and the rest of its foot lifted.
The anatomy of bird legs and feet is diverse, encompassing many accommodations to perform a wide variety of functions. [ 1 ] Most birds are classified as digitigrade animals, meaning they walk on their toes rather than the entire foot.
Leg skeleton of the modern elephant. The hind limb and foot of the elephant are oriented semi-plantigrade, and closely resemble the structure and function of the human foot. The tarsals and metapodials are arranged so as to form an arch, similarly to the human foot. The six toes of each foot of the elephant are enclosed in a flexible sheath of ...
While many mammals can perform other tasks using their forelimbs, their primary use in most terrestrial mammals is one of three main modes of locomotion: unguligrade (hoof walkers), digitigrade (toe walkers), and plantigrade (sole walkers). Generally, the forelimbs are optimised for speed and stamina, but in some mammals some of the locomotion ...
Centipedes have one pair of legs per body segment, with typically around 50 legs, but some species have over 200. The terrestrial animals with the most legs are the millipedes. They have two pairs of legs per body segment, with common species having between 80 and 400 legs overall – with the rare species Illacme plenipes having up to 750 legs.
The leg of an unguligrade mammal also includes the phalanges, the finger and toe bones. Among extinct animals, most early mammals such as pantodonts were plantigrade. A plantigrade foot is the primitive condition for mammals; digitigrade and unguligrade locomotion evolved later.
Diagram of a spider leg and pedipalp – the pedipalp has one fewer segment. Arachnid legs differ from those of insects by the addition of two segments on either side of the tibia, the patella between the femur and the tibia, and the metatarsus (sometimes called basitarsus) between the tibia and the tarsus (sometimes called telotarsus), making a total of seven segments.
A carpal pad is also found on the forelimb which is used for additional traction when stopping or descending a slope in digitigrade species. Additional dewclaws can also be present. The paw also includes a horn-like, beak shaped claw on each digit. Though usually hairless, certain animals do have fur on the soles of their paws.