Dondice occidentalis from Florida

August 1, 2001
From: Anne DuPont

Hi Bill,
How are you and things at the museum? Hope you are having a good summer.

Is this Favorinus auritulus? I took the photos off West Palm Beach, Florida, USA, in about 10 feet of water. The ones I have photographed range in size from 1/2 inch to 1 inch long. We always find them on the hydroids on night dives and we find them with the cerata in several colors, blue, yellow and red. I'm sending you 3 photos to help you with the identification. Thank you again for all the work you do on the Forum.
Best wishes,
Anne DuPont
Delray Beach, Florida, USA

adupont@gate.net

Du Pont, A., 2001 (Aug 1) Dondice occidentalis from Florida. [Message in] Sea Slug Forum. Australian Museum, Sydney. Available from http://www.seaslugforum.net/find/4918

Dear Anne,
Thanks for the photos and your wishes for a good summer. Unfortunately down here it is winter - and last weekend the sea was very wild with a 10-18m swell (30 - 50+ ft) - ferries with broken windows, the port closed to all shipping. I guess it will have made a mess of the intertidal and shallow sublittoral. The waves and moving rocks tend to grind living things to pulp in these conditions.

Now back to your animals. I am pretty sure these are Dondice occidentalis. This species is very variable in colour and I have tried to summarise that variation at the top of the page. Your photos show a nice range in colour variation. They are definitely not Favorinus auritulus which has a couple of bulbous swellings on the rhinophores, rather than many rings, and like all Favorinus, it usually feeds on the eggs of other sea slugs, not on hydroids.
Best wishes,
Bill Rudman

Rudman, W.B., 2001 (Aug 1). Comment on Dondice occidentalis from Florida by Anne DuPont. [Message in] Sea Slug Forum. Australian Museum, Sydney. Available from http://www.seaslugforum.net/find/4918

Factsheet

Dondice occidentalis

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