Hypselodoris nyalya
(Marcus & Marcus, 1967)

Order: NUDIBRANCHIA
Suborder: DORIDINA
Superfamily: EUDORIDOIDEA
Family: Chromodorididae

DISTRIBUTION

Caribbean [Florida, Bahamas, Cuba]

PHOTO

Upper: Southern Bahamas, August 2002. Photo: Paul Young.
Lower: Orange Cay, Bahamas. at 60 feet, May 11, 2003. Photo: Larry Townsend

Unfortunately the original description is based on 2 preserved animals from Florida. The one colour photo shows a fairly dark blue animal and a red mantle border. Another photo (Humann, 1992) also shows a dark blue animal but the border appears to be multicoloured - red on the outside then yellow orange, and white on the inside. The upper animal illustrated here appears to be a pale version of that. Marcus & Marcus place the species in the genus Chromodoris but the shape of the radular teeth, the narrow ribbon, the shape of the jaw plates, and the position of the mantle glands suggest this is most probably a species of Hypselodoris, although Ortea et al (1996) suggest it should be placed in Risbecia. I only know of these three previous records of the species.

References:
• Humann, P. (1992) Reef Creature Identification - Florida, Caribbean, Bahamas.
• Marcus, Er. & Marcus, Ev. (1967) American opisthobranch mollusks. Part 1, Tropical American opisthobranchs. Studies Tropical Oceanography, Miami, 6(1-2): 1-137. (Figs 1-150, Pl.1, figs 1-9)
• Ortea, J., Valdes, A. & Garcia-Gomez, J.C. (1996) Review of the atlantic species of the Family Chromodorididae (Mollusca: Nudibranchia) of the blue chromatic group. Avicennia (Suppl. 1): 1-160.

Authorship details
Rudman, W.B., 2003 (May 28) Hypselodoris nyalya (Marcus & Marcus, 1967). [In] Sea Slug Forum. Australian Museum, Sydney. Available from http://www.seaslugforum.net/factsheet/hypsnyal

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