Marine Flatworms?

May 27, 1998
From: Michael Dyck

I found these around Saxon Reef, near Cairns, North Queensland. They might be a sort of flatworm because there are no gills visible. Just a wild guess on my part, I'm pretty much an amateur at this.
Thanks again
Michael.
Michael Dyck
Shady Cove
Oregin, USA

famdyck@medford.net

Dyck, M., 1998 (May 27) Marine Flatworms?. [Message in] Sea Slug Forum. Australian Museum, Sydney. Available from http://www.seaslugforum.net/find/60

Yes they are flatworms, which are often mistaken for nudibranchs. Flatworms usually glide along much faster than nudibranchs, are much thinner and tend to break up if you handle them. It is true that they don't have gills, but dorids often have theirs contracted. In the field even the most experienced collector occasionally collects a flatworm by mistake or if they are not quite sure. The photo above of Paraplanocera oligoglena (A) shows most of its organs through the almost transparent body wall. The white branched central structure is the proboscis. When feeding, the proboscis is everted through the mouth which is in the centre of the underside of the body. The pale whitish network extending through most of the body is the multi-branched gut which gives these worms the name 'polyclad' (= many branches). Polyclads are hermaphrodite, that is they function as both males and females, and all the other organs that can be seen through the transparent body wall are part of the male and female reproductive systems. Many marine flatworms are very colourful. Wolfgang Seifarth has an excellent website for flatworms .... Bill Rudman

NOTE: The URL of the Marine Flatworms of the World! has changed to:
http://www.rzuser.uni-heidelberg.de/~bu6/index.html [Jan 2000]

Rudman, W.B., 1998 (May 27). Comment on Marine Flatworms? by Michael Dyck. [Message in] Sea Slug Forum. Australian Museum, Sydney. Available from http://www.seaslugforum.net/find/60

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