Spurilla major from Eilat, the Red Sea

March 7, 2008
From: Matan Ninio

Dear Bill,
attached are some pictures taken in Eilat. The color form seems to be mid-way between the "blue" and the "brown" forms of Spurilla major on your site. There have been several other reports of this animal from our waters, and from my memory I think this is the typical color form.

This specific animal was moving quite fast on some sand near coral. We had been delighted to see it, and consider it a gift from Neptune - we had been on the way back from a cleaning dive, loaded with as much trash as we could carry (including a full size drum).

Locality:  Northen Dekel/southen Electric beach, Eilat, Israel, Red Sea.
Depth: 5 m. Length: 45 mm. 24 April 2005. near a coral head. Photographer: Elad Halevi

Matan Ninio

matan@forumhasofiot.yam.dive.ninio.org

Ninio, M., 2008 (Mar 7) Spurilla major from Eilat, the Red Sea. [Message in] Sea Slug Forum. Australian Museum, Sydney. Available from http://www.seaslugforum.net/find/13697

Dear Matan,
Firstly sorry it has taken so long to post this message, I found it when I was preparing the recent interesting report of this species from Turkey [#21174].

I would agree that this is the more usual colour form - or at least the colour form when the animal has been eating anemone's containing zooxanthellae. The brown specks and markings you can see in the close-ups of the rhinophores and cerata are clusters of the zooxanthellae in branches of the digestive gland.

Best wishes,
Bill Rudman

Rudman, W.B., 2008 (Mar 7). Comment on Spurilla major from Eilat, the Red Sea by Matan Ninio. [Message in] Sea Slug Forum. Australian Museum, Sydney. Available from http://www.seaslugforum.net/find/13697

Factsheet

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