Petalifera ramosa with probable eggs

November 29, 2007
From: Ron Greer

I have just read the message from Leanne & David Atkinson [#21017 ] about possible eggs of Petalifera ramosa and remembered a photo I had taken in 2005 showing very different eggs to that show by Leanne and David. The eggs I photographed are not typical of Sea Hares and it may be just coincidence.

Locality: Fly Point, Port Stephens, 8 m, NSW, 22 October 2005, Sand and Rubble. Length: 50 mm. Photographer: Ron Greer.

I was unable to actually see any egg laying, but the sea hare was stationary (almost completely covering the eggs) on the eggs for some minutes. It only stated to move away as I had tried to hard to see actual egg laying and disturbed it. I took the image as it began to move aside.

The second image is of the same animal where I had placed it for a image with good contrast

Regards and thanks for the wonderful site.

Ron Greer

diveimage@netspace.net.au

Greer, R.I., 2007 (Nov 29) Petalifera ramosa with probable eggs. [Message in] Sea Slug Forum. Australian Museum, Sydney. Available from http://www.seaslugforum.net/find/21206

Dear Ron,

Thanks for the nice photos of Petalifera ramosa, and thanks for the photo of the egg ribbon which I am pretty sure are its. I can find no reference to its egg ribbon, but whereas species of Aplysia and Dolabella have a tangled spaghetti-like ribbon there are a number of species in related genera which have an egg ribbon much as in your photo. Dolabrifera brazieri [see message #56] is one of those, and Dolabrifera dolabrifera is reported to have a similar kind (Ostergaard, 1950). Beeman (1970) describes a similar ribbon for Phyllaplysia taylori and Ortea & Martinez (1991) describe a rough spiral egg ribbon for Petalifera petalifera which is attached as in these other species. What is nice about this egg mass similarity is that all of these genera fall into one subfamily of the Aplysiidae - the Dolabriferinae, which is generally accepted on anatomical grounds to be a valid phylogenetic group [see Klussmann-Kolb, 2004]. This is a nice example of the value of recording information on egg ribbons and other non-anatomical traits and behaviours that cannot be seen in collections of preserved animals.

  • Beeman, R. D. (1970) The anatomy and functional morphology of the reproductive system in the opisthobranch mollusk Phyllaplysia taylori Dall, 1900. The Veliger 13: 1-31.
  • Klussmann-Kolb, A. (2004) Phylogeny of the Aplysiidae (Gastropoda, Opisthobranchia) with new aspects of the evolution of the seahares. Zoologica Scripta 33: 439-462.
  • Ortea, J. A. and Martínez, E. (1991) El Orden Anaspidea (Mollusca: Opisthobranchia) en las Islas Canarias. Revista Academia Canaria de las Ciencias 3: 87-107.
  • Ostergaard, J.M. (1950) Spawning and development of some Hawaiian marine gastropods. Pacific Science, 4: 75-115

Best wishes,
Bill Rudman

Rudman, W.B., 2007 (Nov 29). Comment on Petalifera ramosa with probable eggs by Ron Greer. [Message in] Sea Slug Forum. Australian Museum, Sydney. Available from http://www.seaslugforum.net/find/21206

Factsheet

Petalifera ramosa

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