Polychaete, any worm of the class Polychaeta (phylum Annelida). About 8,000 living species are known. Polychaetes, which include rag worms, lugworms, bloodworms, sea mice, and others, are marine worms notable for well-defined segmentation of the body. Unique among annelids, most polychaete body segments bear a pair of parapodia (flat, lobelike outgrowths) with setae, or tiny bristles. Polychaetes vary in size from a few millimetres to about 3 m (10 feet) and are divided informally into two groups; the errantia, or free-moving forms, and sedentaria, or tube-dwelling forms.
The head has short sensory projections (palps) and tentacles. The body is often brightly coloured. The diet consists of minute aquatic plants and animals in some species, while others are purely carnivorous.
The sexes are usually separate; sperm and eggs are discharged directly into the water, where fertilization occurs. Larvae are ciliated and free-swimming. As in some mollusk species, the early larvae are trochophores. Some polychaete species are hermaphroditic (i.e., the functional reproductive organs of both sexes are present in one individual); other species reproduce by budding, in which a portion of an adult’s body breaks away to form a new individual.
Polychaetes play an important role in turning over bottom sediments in the sea. The palolo worm (q.v.) is used as human food in areas of the South Pacific where it swarms in great abundance at breeding time. Other species are used by humans as bait for fishing.