Second record of Trapania tartanella from the UK

August 27, 2009
From: David Kipling


Concerning message #21913:

Dear Bill,

Sarah Bowen and I have now seen a second UK specimen of Trapania tartanella, this time further north. The location is a marine nature reserve on a westerly headland in Wales.

If larvae are coming in from the south (Atlantic coast of France and Spain) then the first landfall on the UK would be either Cornwall (where the first UK sighting was from), or if they land slightly further north then this is where Skomer is.

Locality: Rye Rocks, Skomer Island, Pembrokeshire, 15 m, United Kingdom, Atlantic, 9 August 2009, Sloping rocky reef with boulders, silty and weedy. Photographer: David Kipling.

What is curious is that Skomer is a very well-dived location because it is a marine reserve. Neither specimen was difficult to spot - a large white nudibranch with yellow markings, very visible on some seaweed. I wonder whether many divers do not recognise it as something interesting because it looks at first sight like a common UK species, Polycera faeroensis, and so ignore it.

Best regards

David Kipling,
Cardiff, UK

plankton@dircon.co.uk

Kipling, D., 2009 (Aug 27) Second record of Trapania tartanella from the UK. [Message in] Sea Slug Forum. Australian Museum, Sydney. Available from http://www.seaslugforum.net/find/22609

Thanks David,

You wonder why others don't see such an obvious nudibranch. Humans like most many sighted predators develop a 'search image' for their common or preferred prey. I have taken shell-collectors out to places they are very familiar with and been told "there are no nudibranchs here" only to find them everywhere much to the shell collector's amazement. What is obvious to you is often just not seen by people who don't know what to look for.

Can you give me an indication of size?  You say 'large' nudibranch, but size, like visibility, is relative.

Best wishes,
Bill Rudman

Rudman, W.B., 2009 (Aug 27). Comment on Second record of Trapania tartanella from the UK by David Kipling. [Message in] Sea Slug Forum. Australian Museum, Sydney. Available from http://www.seaslugforum.net/find/22609

Factsheet

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