Notobryon wardi
Odhner, 1936
Order: NUDIBRANCHIA
Suborder: DENDRONOTINA
Family: Scyllaeidae
DISTRIBUTION
Indo-West Pacific (Japan, Queensland, South Africa).
PHOTO
Fly Point, Port Stephens, New South Wales, Australia. November 1999. PHOTO: Ron Greer.
NOTE: At present I am putting all photos which seem to represent species of Notobryon on this page. It is possible that more than one species is represented here.
Notobryon wardi was first described from Queensland, Australia. Baba (1937) described two more species from Japan, one of which (N. bijecurum}, he said differed from N. wardi mainly in having unequal sized mantle lobes, the anterior being larger than the posterior pair. The significance of this feature is unknown as Baba had only a single specimen, and the only study of multiple specimens (Thompson & Brown, 1981), doesn't address this point. Notobryon is closely related to Scyllaea pelagica and Crosslandia viridis. It differs from both in lacking a median tooth in the radula and from Crosslandia, in having a medio-dorsal posterior crest, which is absent in Corosslandia. Both Scyllaea and Notobryon have a medio-dorsal posterior crest, and both use it when disturbed as a 'paddle', to swim by vigorously waving it from side to side. Like Scyllaea, it has dendritic gill-like processes on the inside of the mantle lobes, especially in larger specimens.
Notobryon feeds on hydroids.
References:
• Baba,K (1937) Two new species of the nudibranchiate genus Notobryon from Sagami Bay, Japan. Venus, The Japanese Journal of Malacology, 7(4, November): 165-170.
• Thompson, T.E. & Brown, G.H. (1981) Biology and relationships of the nudibranch mollusc Notobryon wardi in South Africa, with a review of the Scyllaeidae. Journal of Zoology 194(4): 437-444.
Rudman, W.B., 2000 (May 29) Notobryon wardi Odhner, 1936. [In] Sea Slug Forum. Australian Museum, Sydney. Available from http://www.seaslugforum.net/factsheet/notoward
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