Mary Rumpho of the University of Maine, is an expert on E. chlorotica and has now discovered how the sea slug gets this ability: it photosynthesises with genes “stolen” from the algae it eats.

She has known for some time that E. chlorotica acquires chloroplasts – the green cellular objects that allow plant cells to convert sunlight into energy – from the algae it eats, and stores them in the cells that line its gut.

Young E. chlorotica fed with algae for two weeks, could survive for the rest of their year-long lives without eating, Rumpho found in earlier work.

If only they weren’t temperate nudis.  They sound like they’d make a great addition to a reef tank!

This idea for this post came from a recent discovery of a second use for my (and possibly other) cleaner shrimps. I was battling a new reef pest, specific to the Porites genus, that consumed the algae within the coral. It was this unknown nudibranch, which was spreading quite quickly on the coral , that prompted me to look for ways for its removal. Let me illustrate what this nudibranch looked like (I didn’t have the chance to take pictures of my own, as I was too busy extracting it from my coral. So a big thanks to Kurt448 on Reef Central for these wonderful photos):

The problem with these little guys is that A: are super hard to see, and B: multiply very fast.  The only good point about them is that it looks like they are specific to only Porites.

So after battling these guys for months, preforming dips and manual extractions, I had decided to move the coral into my refugium. Currently, the refuge contains only macro algae, some docile inverts (cuke, snails), and a pair of cleaners. Unfortunately for the coral, it was left unattended for about 4 days in the refuge. It was lit only by a single 60w CFL. Poor thing wasn’t even getting enough light, and was covered with these nudibranchs and their eggs.

It took four days for my cleaner shrimp to finish the buffet table. Day 5 came. I removed the coral with the intent to try to dip it again in some ReVive. To my amazement, the nudis and their masses of eggs were all gone. Not a single egg or nudi in sight. By deduction, and only by that method, I came to the conclusion that the cleaner shrimps disposed of the predatory nudibranchs.

Maybe we haven’t given our cute little shrimp a chance to showcase their other abilities. Could they also eat Red Bugs? AEFWs? Monti nudibrachs? Maybe we need more experimentation with these creatures that we call cleaner shrimps!

Until next time reefnecks!

How does your heart skip three times? Mine usually does when it discovers that you have a monti nudi infestation! Today I was curiously wondering why my Tyree True Undata has been losing flesh on its top side. It has been amazingly resilient over the years and has lasted many mishaps. So why now? Why the skin loss? RTN?

So my first instinct is to inspect the underside of any montipora that looks stressed. And low and behold… a monti eating nudibrach infestation! Need proof? Look at these eggs..

Yes, the little specks of light are the egg sacs. I didn’t take pictures of the actual nudis, as by then I was frantically blowing them off the montipora. There must have been about 100′s of nudibranchs, and about 1,000′s of eggs. The dead area on that underside is all of the eaten flesh by the nudibranchs. No wonder the coral was extremely stressed.

Yes, those are the nudibranch in question. Swimming (dying) in some nice cool tap water. And no, I didn’t use tap water to dip the montipora… that would ultimately kill (or severely stress) your coral.

Now the followup on this situation would be to look for more eggs or hatchlings in the same area. If you find them, they would be easy to extract. You must do it as soon as possible to prevent them from growing and producing more eggs. The benefit of this is that they don’t produce eggs which float in the water column. They secrete them on the underside or dead parts of the montipora.  It takes time, but you will win this with patience. Make sure you check EVERY montipoira in your tank if you do have monti eating nudis.

Now let my heart skip back into its normal rhytm. Maybe I need a shot of Jack Daniels with a beer as a chaser…

Patrick Krug studies them as a way to understand how new species form in the sea, and how global warming causes range shifts among coastal organisms — but mainly, he’s drawn to their dramatic sex lives. Patrick’s talk will explore the world of frustrated virgins, slug swingers, and inappropriate sex between species, illustrated with videos and slides sure to shock the more prudish of terrestrial vertebrates.

From Patrick’s site:

We study the ecologyand evolution of marine invertebrate larvae, using sea slugs as a model system to understand the causes and consequences of dispersal strategies in the sea.

If you go, let us know what it’s like!

Fascinating Nudibranch article with stunning pictures from David Doubilet who is well known for his under water photography. Be sure to check out his reef photo gallery.

Link via Boing Boing.