ID Please

[sage_commander]

This guy has doubled in size since Saturday.

http://i111.photobucket.com/albums/n128/sage_commander/Critter5-29-07.jpg

Any ideas? Thanks.

[Sk8r]

looks like a sponge, maybe pineapple sponge. Harmless, but can be a bit of a pest.

[sage_commander]

Sorry Sk8r, I forgot to mention that it moves all over like a slug. It actually looks like what a snail might look like without its shell.

[sage_commander]

Went to the TBS site and found this:

http://i111.photobucket.com/albums/n128/sage_commander/db_68_Unknown_slug.jpg

It's a white sea slug. Should I leave him in?

[techreef]

It doesn't really look like a polyclad flatworm to me, as it seems to have quite a bit of bulk. I'd post this pic or a link to this thread in the Other Invertebrates forum here on RC. There are some super experts that frequent that board. They'll most likely have an ID for you.

[pagojoe]

You will probably need to remove the animal and photograph it in a dish of water to get the details necessary for a positive ID. I've seen three different posts recently that appear to be this animal, but I don't think any of them ever got satisfactory answers. It may be a velutinid, but I don't have access to a tremendous number of photos of this family. It does look too "bulky" to be a flatworm.

Cheers,



Don

[pagojoe]

By the way, I can't tell for sure, but it looks like the animal has a snail-like head. The Velutinidae are extremely varied, but in general, they are somewhat tent shaped, like a flatworm with a hump in the middle. Here is one resembles your animal, although I doubt it's actually the same species:

http://www.seaslug.info/display.cfm?id=13816



Don

[pagojoe]

Cruise these in your spare time:

http://www.seaslug.info/showall.cfm?base=lamellar

[clayspst]

i have one also. it is in my overflow

[sage_commander]

Thanks for those links, Don. It looks a lot like Lamellaria diegoensis from Oregon, from that second link. I have not caught it munching on anything I want to keep around, but I'm going to keep an eye on his size.

It does have a snail-like head. He has a "snout," as my wife put it. He also glides quite easily over the rock.

[pagojoe]

You're welcome. If it is a velutinid, it will probably feed on colonial ascidians, as Bill Rudman notes in the links above. It probably has an internal shell that will look somewhat like a normal snail shell. If the animal dies, or if you decide to remove it, drop the animal in bleach for a few minutes and remove the soft tissue from the shell, then save the shell. The shell, along with your photos of the live animal, could be valuable to a researcher working on this family (and should enable a positive ID, assuming the animal has a name already).

Cheers,


Don