Aglaophenia tubulifera

David Kipling Doto lemchei on Aglaophenia tubulifera. (Pembrokeshire).

David Fenwick Snr That's very nice David

Bernard Picton With an internal Splancnotrophus parasite, those are its eggs in the middle of the back.

Carissa Shipman This is so cool! Studying the Doto and studied the parasites that infect sea slugs! They are very difficult to remove from sea slugs.

David Kipling And the answer is ....

Becky Hitchin Aglaophenia?

Becky Hitchin But I say that for any fluffy hydroids with gonothecae obvious!

Tony Gilbert Yes, Aglaophenia pluma

David Kipling We went with George Brown and recorded this as Aglaophenia tubulifera. Dawn?

Bernard Picton A. pluma is mostly in shallow water, usually on large algae like Halidrys or Sacoglossum. It also grows directly on rock in areas of high water movement. It is quite a dark brown in colour, tubulifera is the only one in our area which is this yellow colour.

George Brown Is there a prize?

David Kipling I've just been pimped by Dawn Watson. My life is complete...

George Brown Changed my mind it's Holothuria forskali!

Tony Gilbert Ok, thanks, noted.

David Kipling Heavily cropped picture of an 'ydroid fruiting body. Two ready to go and one released by the look of it. Also, guess the species ;) [OK easier in the full image, so I'm disqualifying myself].

David Kipling These fruiting bodies are very funky, I must take more pics. I thought it was some weird critter initially!

Douglas Herdson I have not looked at these for years, but could it be Dynamena pumila? Unfortunately I do not have Jo Porter's book to check. Lovely gonathecae.

Bernard Picton These structures are called corbulae (baskets). They are a modified side-branch which is folded around the gonothecae.

David Kipling Ah yes, I see - the one that is empty is clearly growing out from where a side-arm should be, there's a gap in the run. Cute!

George Brown Been a long day, just in, but how about Aglaophenia tubulifera?

Joanne Porter yes lovely gonothecae! I was teaching my classes about these today ;-)

David Kipling Full-size image now posted ;) I'm going to take more pics of these gonothecae next year, they're dead cute!