Scyllaea pelagica in Miami

April 9, 2010
From: Jonathan Cohen

Hello,

Just wanted to share these pictures and video that I took in Sunny Isles Beach Florida near Aventura. We saw this thing swimming in the ocean and caught it in a pail. After contacting Prof. Nancy Voss of the Rosenstiel School at the University of Miami she identified it as "a nudibranch mollusk, possibly Scyllaea pelagica, the sargassum nudibranch".

Here is the link to the video, incredible how this thing swims:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zr_hePDEklo

Locality: Sunny Isles Beach, 2 feet or 0.5 m , FL, USA, Atlantic Ocean, 03 April 2010. Length: 2.5 inches. Photographer: Jonathan Cohen.

Enjoy,
Jonathan

jcsultan@gmail.com

JC Sultan, 2010 (Apr 9) Scyllaea pelagica in Miami. [Message in] Sea Slug Forum. Australian Museum, Sydney. Available from http://www.seaslugforum.net/find/23450

Dear Jonathan,

Thanks for the link to your clip of Scyllaea pelagica swimming. Quitye a few of the group of nudibranchs that Scyllaea belongs to [Dendronotina] swim in a similar manner by lateral flexing of the body. The best example must be Bornella anguilla which has multiple waves running down the body so its swims like an eel - hence the name anguilla which is from the Latin for an eel.

Best wishes,
Bill Rudman

Rudman, W.B., 2010 (Apr 9). Comment on Scyllaea pelagica in Miami by Jonathan Cohen. [Message in] Sea Slug Forum. Australian Museum, Sydney. Available from http://www.seaslugforum.net/find/23450

Factsheet

Scyllaea pelagica

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