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Image courtesy of David Cowdery
Anilao, Batangas, hilippines
Nudibranch Workshop, May 2023
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Image courtesy of David Cowdery  |
Marionia (Animal, mollusk, sea slug, He & She - it is a hermaphrodite) sp. 8 in NSSI 2nd Ed. While my best friend, Sea Slug God and curator of Invertebrate Zoology, at the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco, Dr. Terry Gosliner, and his student Vic Smith, former member of the Jefferson Starship, have made the latest dent in the number of tritonid species described, there are still dozens undescribed. Specialized predators on octocorals, including soft corals, gorgonians and sea pens. The two largest groups Tritonia and Marionia, are differentiated by internal characters. It could be a long time before the list of undescribed species is reduced. I am not sure where to start to describe this guy (she, her, he, him) to you externally. The single most characteristic feature is the pattern of reticulated polygons on the mantle having patches of light and dark brown, the junctions of the polygons with dark blue lines and at some of the junctions lighter, bright blue spots. Whew - that was a mouthful. The clavus of the rhinophores is variable but is often green as seen in David's photo tp the left. If I were going to describe this cutie I'd name it, Marionia reallyvariablis. . Thanks for sharing Dave . New Braunfels, TX Mar., 2024 Send Dave email at davidwbehrens@gmail.com |
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Terry Gosliner in the field |
Dave Cowdery is a retired bio-medical Engineer and is the inventor of the Alumina/Titanium hermetic feedthrough (1970) for implantable bionics and the first to introduce a Titanium casing. This invention created the first bionic implant (pacemaker) with a service life that could be measured in years rather than months and is the basis for todays huge multi billion dollar bionic industry. David's pacemaker invention and his critical contribution to the launching of the Cochlear hearing implant has recently been recognised in two authoritative books ( "Innovative and Intelligent Bioceramics in Translational Medicine" and "Alumina Ceramics-Biomedical and Clinical Applications"). David is a Divemaster with over 5,500 dives experience and is based near Byron Bay in Australia. David is also a keen competitive road bicycle rider covering over 400 km most weeks. Photographic equipment used Nikon D800 camera with DS160 substrobes.
Send Dave mail at divec@ozemail.com.au
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