Dendrodoris warta - more photos
July 12, 2005
From: Carol Grant
Hi Bill,
Thanks for your reply [#14223 ] It may not be "the" holy grail for slug guys, but maybe there are a number of "holy grails"???? That said, I bet he would be one. At least the research group that first documented him in 2004 at
Gray's Reef, Georgia, were quite excited!
Here are more pics. The color on these pics is very accurate to what the camera took (and what I saw). Only thing I did with these pics is take away some of the off color cast common to digital photos and I sharpened them. I did not crop or remove scatter as I usually would. I thought you could tell the size of the slug more with everything in tact. Viz was pretty poor, maybe 20 feet, maybe 15. Only used the internal flash so a couple still have lots of green shadow.
Carol
caroldive@mac.com
Grant, C., 2005 (Jul 12) Dendrodoris warta - more photos. [Message in] Sea Slug Forum. Australian Museum, Sydney. Available from http://www.seaslugforum.net/find/14249Thanks Carol,
This is a very valuable contribution. Measuring nudibranchs precisely is impossible because their length is very plastic, and can change considerably depending on whether they are resting or crawling. It is clealry one of the 'big' species of Dendrodoris. Don't feel bad about not photographing its underside - most of us don't. However in your photo alongside I can see a quite mottled pattern, quite similar to that on the dorsum.
Concerning its food, Marcus & Gallagher (1976) report that it was found in the field feeding on an orange sponge boring into oysters and specimens were kept alive in aquaria by adding oysters with the boring sponge. The bright orange faeces produced by the Dendrodoris confirming its choice of food.
Best wishes,
Bill Rudman
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