Dendronotus lacteus

Tine Kinn Kvamme Dendronotus lacteus 60 mm length at 13 meters dept. From Drøbak in the Oslo Fjord, Norway. Canon G12, internal flash +handheld torch

Gary Cobb Because of the brown botches on the dorsum I would say Dendonotus lacteus

Gary Cobb

Tine Kinn Kvamme Thanks Gary :)

Gary Cobb My pleasure!

Carol Horne Any ideas re this little white nudi? Sound of Mull last Sunday.

David Kipling Dendronotus frondosus I think ...

Carol Horne I see what you mean, ie white with the merest sprinkling of spots - but it seems to lack the 'arborescent' gills mentioned in habitas?

David Kipling Yeah, but if you look closely (zoom in) bottom middle and also on the top edge there's the impression of some branching-ness on the lumps. They can pull them in.

Sarah Bowen Also I think he's a real baby, so they have probably not developed completely yet.

Carol Horne Ah, yes. I can see them. I did wonder if they could pull them in. Thanks David. Poor photo cos my camera controls were stuck and couldn't get macro. Next season will upgrade - or failing that get a strobe like those you showed me earlier this year. This will help until I can manage a better lens

Carol Horne Thanks Sarah...oh no, not juveniles...having enough trouble id'ing adults!!:-):-)

David Kipling Well there's Tritonia homberghii … as a juvenile it's while and lives on dead man's fingers, and as an adult it changes so much they thought it was a different species!

Carol Horne Aaargghhh!

Sarah Bowen You're not helping, David...

David Kipling Are you sure this isn't T homberghii var alba Sarah?

Sarah Bowen Stop it!

David Kipling No seriously, could it be?

Carol Horne It's rather like a tennis match.....aces all around! catch up with you guys next season:-)

Sarah Bowen Shame you can't see us sitting only a few feet apart on our respective laptops then! Yes, hope to make it up to North Wales again next year!

Brendan Oonk Can I offer an other sugestion: Dendronotus lacteus

David Kipling Argh!!!!!

Carol Horne Just looked it up...yes, a distinct possibility. The 'feel' of it somehow matches what I saw....not scientific I know, but ......

Fiona Crouch My first thought T. homberghii before I saw the debate between David and Sarah.

Carol Horne Oh dear......off I go to look this up...I'll never get to bed tonight...

Brendan Oonk http://www.nudibranch.org/Scottish%20Nudibranchs/html/dendronotus-lacteus-05.html

Carol Horne Yes!! Just looked pics of Tombergii juveniles. As far as I can see no red spots

Carol Horne Goodnight all....D lacteus wins at the moment.

David Kipling Habitat doesn't really help. If T homberghii should be sitting on a dead man's finger if white, if Dendronotus should be munching short hydroids. That being said, we did see plenty of white Dendronotus in the Firth or Lorn in Sept, and this was Mull.

Peter H van Bragt have a close look look at the tip og

Peter H van Bragt of the rhinophoral sheath on the right side. Not very sharp but the split that you can see is highly indicative for T. hombergii

Tine Kinn Kvamme Dendronotus frondosus. Drøbak, Norway. 25 mm at 5 meters dept.

Irine Ekimova It is Dendronotus lacteus, D. frondosus has the different pattern of branching ceratae

Tine Kinn Kvamme Thank you very much Irine Ekimova. I just thought it was a color variation, because I read they could be white as well.

Irine Ekimova Yes, they could be white, but the primary branches are not so long as in D. lacteus (see the photo, it is white specimen of D.frondosus from the Barents Sea). Also secondary and tertiary branches in D. lacteus are shorter and more pointed. But the best way you could distinguished them is the morphology of radula of course :)

Tine Kinn Kvamme I def see the difference between the two now. Thanks for enlightening me :-)

Tine Kinn Kvamme Irine, I just getting used to seeing nudibranchs here i Norway. I have most of my dives in Thailand. Do you know if any of the frondosus color variation are one in redish with yellow on the tips of the fringes?

Tine Kinn Kvamme ...or you would call the fringesa cerata?

Irine Ekimova Сolour variations of D. frondosus can be very diverse. They include all variations from white to yellow, brown or even reddish brown. But the problem is that some specimens of D. lacteus also could be brown or red. So the best way to distinguish them is to pay attention to the branching pattern of ceratae. In my MSc thesis I studied genus Dendronotus in Russian seas, so I have a lot of photos of these two species and others too. Unfortunately, the paper is just preparing now, but if you want I could share some photos and drawings with you :)

Avril Keith i dont have a clue what this is, but i found loads of them on the rocks at the farne islands last weekend.

David Kipling Dendronotus frondotus. It eats kelp fir, hence why it's on kelp. Very cute species !

Avril Keith wow thanks..can you recommend me a reference book on nudis? ive only got paul naylors book and it only touches on them.

David Kipling Bernard Picton's field guide (out of print, hunt it down on eBay or abebooks).

Avril Keith thankyou so much x

George Brown Or Bernard's website http://www.habitas.org.uk/marinelife/index.html

Jane Wilkinson Picton's nudibranch book is like golddust Avril and if you're lucky enough to find one you'll have to pay a fortune for it! Try Jim Anderson's site Scottish Nudibranchs. You'll find practically everything you need on there. Nice pic by the way.

Craig Muirhead Try http://www.habitas.org.uk/marinelife/

Avril Keith ive been on ebay and amazon and seems none...lol but a link says that book might be reprinted...

Craig Muirhead The mollusca section is basically Bernard's book in digital format.

Craig Muirhead Jim's site is very good too of course :)

Jane Wilkinson I think he'd be glad that you added that comment :D You being his dive buddy an all.

Laura Shearer This species is fairly common around here but stunning little individual there- nice pic!!!

Avril Keith i havent been lucky with spotting nudibrancs in my last year of diving and i was over whelmed by them in the farnes :) it was amazing to see so many

Laura Shearer They are numerous around the Farnes and nice variety of species :) good vis certainly helps too!!

Bernard Picton Avril, were all of the Dendronotus you saw at the Farnes this colour? We had large numbers near Oban three weeks ago, mostly white but a few like this. We know that Dendronotus lacteus is a different species, but I think it may come in red, brown and white forms.

David Kipling Are you suggesting the white ones are adapted to lived in the dark abyssal depths, only to be preyed upon by the lone B. pictonesis with its specialised MgCl2-containing venom gland?

Avril Keith Yes they were all red x

George Brown Hey! He wasn't entirely alone!

Bernard Picton I did spend considerable time in the kelp, Dawn. Had to decompress somewhere....

Jane Wilkinson Also red ones at Loch Carron a month ago

Bernard Picton If you want the text for the book it is here: http://www.seaslug.org.uk/nudibranchs/

David Kipling You don't get out of doing a reprint *that* easy, Bernard ...

Jane Wilkinson We'd all like a reprint Bernard! Frustrating miles from anywhere with no signal trying to ID stuff.

Bernard Picton I should point out to you that we know that Dendronotus frondosus is not a single species, but at least 4 in Norway. So sets of photos of animals which make up a single population are useful to try and pin down variation within these cryptic species.

Bernard Picton Reprint - yes, working on it. I'd like it to stand the test of the next 20 years, so needs some names for some undescribed Doto and probably several other cryptic species. We now know that even the common grey seaslug, Aeolidia papillosa, is two species in the NE Atlantic..