Flabellina iodinea

April 20, 2001
From: Brett Maton

Hi,
I was wondering if you could add the common name of this species (Flabellina iodinea) which is known as a "Spanish Shawl" to most Californian scuba divers. Had great fun trying to track it down here :)
Brett

matonb@hotmail.com

Maton, B., 2001 (Apr 20) Flabellina iodinea. [Message in] Sea Slug Forum. Australian Museum, Sydney. Available from http://www.seaslugforum.net/find/4171

Dear Brett,
Happy to add the common name 'Spanish Shawl'. Now that your message is on board the SEARCH button will find the page in future.

The reason I don't use common names is that they can be very confusing. Often they are not 'common' but are made up for colour photo books at the insistence of editors who think readers are dumb and won't understand scientific names. Another problem is that 'real' common names, that is names that are really in common use, are often used only in a small part of a species geographic range. And a third problem is that the same common name can be used for quite different species in different places. One of the reasons scientific names were 'invented' was to provide a single name for each species which could be used throughout the world.

Gardeners use scientific names for their plants all the time and often don't realise they are doing it, so I don't see why animal lovers think it's difficult. Using scientific names would solve a lot of problems.
Best wishes,
Bill Rudman

Rudman, W.B., 2001 (Apr 20). Comment on Flabellina iodinea by Brett Maton. [Message in] Sea Slug Forum. Australian Museum, Sydney. Available from http://www.seaslugforum.net/find/4171

Factsheet

Flabellina iodinea

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