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David Fenwick Snr As a newcomer here I am very pleased to report to this group a find of two
Doris ocelligera on the 06.04.12, intertidally at Lariggan Rocks, Wherrytown, Penzance, Cornwall. SW 46795 29305. David Kipling identified it for me; he also says the site is within 1km of two other records of this slug in Mounts Bay, Penzance. I have placed further images on my website at http://www.aphotomarine.com/sea_slug_doris_ocelligera.html
David Kipling This is only the 5th time this species has been seen in the UK, all in the extreme south west. The summary on the SSF gives the details. The photo of the specimen caught by Lin Baldock and Julia Nunn is particularly similar to this specimen ... yellow with dark dots on the end of the tubercles. We saw our first specimen in Mount's Bay in 2003, so great news that the colony seems to be still there!
Bernard Picton Well done David and David, this is an important record.
David Fenwick Snr Another curious yellow slug, thankfully not Berthella this time. Haven't a clue what it is despite doing a lot of looking. Has anyone come across it ?
David Fenwick Snr It's about 12mm and found under a rock in a pool at Lariggan Rocks, Penzance, Cornwall. 06.04.12.
Steve Trewhella Onchidoris muricata ?
David Kipling There have been a few records of
Doris ocelligera from the Penzance area. That can come in a yellow form with dark tips to the tubercles (which you seem to have here). Only a handful of UK records to date, it's on the northernmost limits of its range.
David Kipling See here in particular Julia Nunn's picture of the yellow variant.
http://www.seaslugforum.net/showall/doriocel
David Fenwick Snr Thanks David that's the beast, flatter than O. muricata, white tubercules, and larger tubercules in the centre getting smaller round the edges and with like you say dark tips to the tubercules. Brilliant. It just didn't fit in with O. muricata or
Adalaria proxima, know I know why. Just as your mail came in I grey scaled the images and increased brightness and contrast to see what it would look like being white. It still didn't look like O. muricata, I think what stands out the most is that the slug is flatter than O. muricata and the tubercules are larger down the center, O. muricata seem to be quite uniform and equal sized. Thanks David
David Kipling Do re-post to NEAN, it's a good find!
David Kipling Jim Anderson has a good selection of (Scottish) O muricata here, which show those even-shaped tubercles all the way to the edge.
http://www.nudibranch.org/Scottish%20Nudibranchs/onchidoris-muricata.html
David Kipling The other key thing are those dark spots that make the tubercles look like little chimneys. And as you say, the tubercles get smaller near the edge.
David Fenwick Snr Just been to http://www.seaslugforum.net/showall/doriocel and read about all the Cornish records. Glad to see there's a Mounts Bay record for the species. Will sent the info on and make sure your records also go on the ERICA database; the species doesn't currently feature. Thanks David
David Kipling There is another Penzance record; in (?) 2009 Matt Swardlow of Buglife was rummaging around in the rockpools under the Jubilee swimming pool on the seafront and found one. It got a mention in Simon Barnes' column in the Times (Aug 22 2009) under the heading 'Dirty Doris'. Text of the article is copied below.
"Dirty Doris
Biodiversity is one of the great resources of a nation, or a planet, and it is to be celebrated in its endless forms most beautiful.
So I called Matt Shardlow at the invertebrate charity, Buglife, to
ask what I had seen on the Cornish cliffs. It looked, I said, like
an ichneumon wasp. It was, he told me, an ichneumon wasp, so I was delighted with myself. It was slender, long-bodied, with a
rather floaty flight and a ginger band round what we
entomologists call the bum. The ichneumons are a large group:
this was a species of Netelia, and I am the richer for knowing
this.
But Matt himself had done rather better on his own Cornish jaunt. He had, he told me, found
Doris ocelligera in a rockpool. This is a sea slug 2cm long, and it is only the third time that one has been found in this country. It is rare throughout its range, a dirty white thing with dirty white lumps that have dark tips. And no one has any idea at all what it eats. Isn’t that all strangely and quietly wonderful?
There’s beauty everywhere, if you care to look. Good idea not to destroy it, in my view."
(reposted from
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/simon_barnes/article6805779.ece)
David Kipling I hope Jan Light is listening to this, she wrote up the original sightings for Mollusc World.
David Kipling Matt's record is useful as it confirms you can find this critter in rockpools (which is where you found it David?). Ie it's not a just deep-water critter.
David Kipling If confirmed, yours is only the fifth ever sighting in the UK (AFAIK). Bernard Picton will probably want you to pickle it!
David Fenwick Snr Sadly we put them back, we found two under the same rock, they were in a small middleshore pool on the west side of the rocks at Lariggan Rocks. Can look for them again if Bernard wants to see them.
David Kipling It would be interesting to know what else is under that rock. The shape of the nudi makes it look like a sponge, with those little chimneys looking like oscules. The information I can find suggests that it is a sponge-eating Dorid, with suggested foods including Halichondria, Haliclona and Hymeniacidon, based on this review:
http://www.theveliger.org/nudibranch_food.html
Any encrusting sponges under those rocks?
David Fenwick Snr I think we'd best have a look for some more !!!
David Kipling You took this specimen from Lariggan Rocks in Penzance. This is 1km along the coast from the outdoor swimming pool where Matt Shardlow from Buglife made his 2009 rockpool sighting of this species. Add to that our own sighting (at 25m deep on a wreck about 1km south of this point in the bay) then it sounds like you have got a stable(ish) local population of this species in Mount's Bay.
David Fenwick Snr We regularly go to Chimney Rocks (west of swimming pool) and haven't seen it there yet, but we'll keep a good eye out for it now though, and also at other sites as across the bay.
Bernard Picton David Fenwick, this is a really exciting find. I've never seen one, but it does look as though it is now well-established on the south coast there. Julia Nunn, found more than one (mentioned above). There are no old records at all from this far north, so a good candidate for climate change spread.
Ian Smith Could I ask for help in translating the Latin part of Bergh's original description of
Doris ocelligera? Here it is with my, probably laughable, translation attempt: "Color supra variabilis, lutescens vel e coeruleo clare nigrescens vel niger,
tuberculorum apice ocellis obscurioribus ; rhinophoriis albescens, branchia coerulescens. "
"Upper colour variable, muddy or clear blackish blue or black,
tubercle apices dark like little eyes (ocellate); rhinophores whitish, gills bluish." Many thanks for any help. I have made an attempt to translate the longer German description. If there is a member with decent command of English and German who would be willing to check it for me I would be so grateful. Please would you contact me via "message" so I can send it directly by email.
Peter H van Bragt Ian, if it is not too much I might be able to help you with the German txt. cheers Peter H van Bragt
Ian Smith Many thanks Peter H van Bragt. I'll send you a file via message. Groetjes, Ian