Here is a URL about tardigrades:http://www.nhm.ac.uk/hosted_sites/quekett/tardi.htm
There is a picture of the little critters, which vaguely resemble a bear. The name means
"slow walker". At first I had it confused with "plantigrade" meaning walking on the whole sole
of the foot, which bears do.
tardigrade
n.
5Fr < L tardigradus, slow-paced: see TARDY & GRADE6any of a phylum (Tardigrada) of minute water animals with segmented bodies and four pairs of unsegmented legs, often regarded as primitive arthropods