What Is a Vertebrate Learn about the animals of the Vertebrata subphylum

laughs what is vertebrate today we're going to talk about very interesting group of animals the vertebrates scientists believe the very first vertebrates evolved around 525 million years ago and today only around five percent of all animal species are vertebrates so what makes an animal vertebrate let's find out there are five key characteristics that make vertebrates stand out from other animals they have backbone skull endoskeleton bilateral symmetry and two pairs of appendages these characteristics allow their muscles to attach to points that can be used for movement all vertebrates belong to larger group called vertebrata and all vertebrates have complex differentiation of body tissue and organs which means that the tissue and organs are separate from each other and can perform independent functions in the body they also have heart and kidneys pretty cool vertebrates are also classified into seven different classes based on their anatomical and physical features let's take closer look at each of these classes first up we have mammals humans and platypuses are just couple of examples of mammals mammals are endothermic which means they can regulate their body temperature regardless of the surrounding environmental temperature next we have Birds birds have feathers toothless beaks and high metabolic rate they also lay hard shelled eggs and are often referred to as avian dinosaurs then we have reptiles some examples of reptiles include snakes crocodiles to Terrace and turtles unlike mammals reptiles are ectothermic which means their regulation of body temperature depends on external factors they are also tetrapods which means they have four feet amphibians like frogs toads and salamanders are also tetrapods and ectothermic they have shellless eggs and breed in water they undergo metamorphosis from aquatic larval forms to terrestrial adults moving on to fish we find the last three vertebrate classes bony fish cartilaginous fish and jawless fish sea horses are an example of bony fish they have skeleton made of bone rather than cartilage bony fish are the largest class of vertebrates sharks Rays skates and sawfish are examples of cartilaginous fish and primitive fish like lampreys and hagfish are examples of jawless fish well there you have it we have learned some interesting facts about vertebrates today let's review true or false vertebrates have five main characteristics that set them apart from other animals true these characteristics are backbone skull endoskeleton bilateral symmetry and two pairs of appendages fill in the blank vertebrates all belong to larger group called blank vertebrata what vertebrate class do frogs belong to amphibians very nice work vertebrate Scholars even though vertebrates are not the most common animals on Earth they are still super important thanks for joining us today and we'll see you next time hope you had fun learning with us visit us at learnbrite.org for thousands of free resources and TurnKey solutions for teachers and homeschoolers foreign