Land creature with no eyes?

Celting asked me if there is any creature which lives above the ground but has no eyes. I can’t think of any. Can you? :confused:

We are specifically not counting cave creatures.

Many species of springtailare blind - and I believe some of those species are found above ground.

Define creature. I assume you mean multi-cellular animals. Do flatworms or annelids count? How about Tardigrades, they don’t seem to have eyes and at least some of them live above ground.

Also, define eye. Do you require it to be able to form an image, or do simple light-sending eyespot count?

Also, define above-ground. :smiley: F’rinstance, what about a tapeworm? It’s existence is certainly above the ground, but it never sees the light of day.

Does this guy count?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centipedes#Geophilomorpha

Or this?

http://australianmuseum.net.au/Blind-Scolopendrid-Centipede

Yep, centipedes and springtails count. The opinion of our distinguished judge is that “Tapeworms are sorta cheating because they live in a sort of cave, it’s just a squishy one.”:smiley:

Thanks very much to all who answered!

There are also the golden moles of southern Africa. They burrow during the day but hunt on the surface at night.

YouTube link to a BBC video segment featuring one species (1:51)

By “without eyes” I presume you mean species that never evolved organs of light detection.

Cave creatures actually have vestigial eye processes, but they atrophied through selection, because they wereof no value when the species moved into the cave, and the absence of eyes presented no disadvantage for which to be selected out.

There was a high probability of light sensor organs developing in any creature on earth, owing to the day-night cycle of light. The capacity to detect light had survival value because it enabled a creature to tell time and keep track of it, for cyclical breeding purposes. Ideal intervals for breeding, when most terrestrial creatures were emerging from the seas, took place according to tidal cycles, which also corresponded to light intensities from the sun and moon. So it had survaval value for a creature to be able to detect light, and accordingly, synchronize its breeding cycle with that of optimal tides.

I presumed the OP merely meant ‘no functional sense of vision’.

Caecilians meet some of your standards but not all. They’re amphibians. Reasons why I am unsure are: they can see light/dark, but not much shape; at any rate, vision isn’t their primary sense. Also many species are underground, but some are aquatic. And are capable of leaving water.

I take blind to mean “can’t see” as well, not completely eyeless.

Eyes are organs that detect light and convert it into electro-chemical impulses in neurons. (Wiki)

“No eyes” means such organs are absent.

Thank you. All of that was quite obvious to me. However, I read the intent of the OP to be asking about non-sighted creatures, regardless of the precise physiological details.