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Dermatobranchus funiculus
Image courtesy of Marcel TankeAnilao, Batangas, Philippines
Dermatobranchus funiculus taken by Marcel Tanke, Lembeh, Indonesia
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Dermatobranchus funiculus Gosliner & Fahey, 2011
This critter is the perfect example of variation within a single species of nudibranch. When we prepared Indo-Pacific Nudibranchs, the gang at Nudibranch Central, in San Fransisco, had not quite finished their study of the internal anatomy of the 21 undescribed species shown in the book. Once they did we learned that our Dermatobranchus species 9, 18 and 21 were in fact all the same species and named D. funiculus. The name "funiculus" was given to draw attention to a highly diagnostic character for this species. Funiculus means "rope" or "cord" describing the appearance of the longitudinal ridges on the dorsum. Only Dermatobranchus albus has similar ridges, but differs internally. This specie has an orange frontal margin, a pinkish-orange mantle border and the apex of the rhinophores is white. Lumping the geographic locations from the book and from the photos Marcel has taken the species is known from Southern Japan and Okinawa, the Philippines and Indonesia. |
Sammamish, WA 98074
Sept., 2013
Send Dave email at davidwbehrens@gmail.com
Marcel and wife Marion at Club Ocellaris, Anilao, Philippines
Marcel and Marion presently again live in their native country, the Netherlands. They started diving during the 14 years that they lived in China and Korea. Marcel has BSAC Instructor diving level. Diving took them pretty much all over Asia and many other places. Nudibranchs became their main interest after several trips to the Philippines and Indonesia. Marion is "spotter" for the nudibranchs and Marcel is taking the pictures. Marcel is still using his "point and click" Canon Ixus 900TI Digital Camera (see http://slugsite.us/bow2007/nudwk586.htm ) Send Marcel email at marceltanke@cs.com
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