''Cadlina laevis'',
common name
In biology, a common name of a taxon or organism (also known as a vernacular name, English name, colloquial name, country name, popular name, or farmer's name) is a name that is based on the normal language of everyday life; and is often contrast ...
the white Atlantic cadlina, is a
species
In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...
of
sea slug
Sea slug is a common name for some marine invertebrates with varying levels of resemblance to terrestrial slugs. Most creatures known as sea slugs are gastropods, i.e. they are sea snails (marine gastropod mollusks) that over evolutionary t ...
, a dorid
nudibranch
Nudibranchs () are a group of soft-bodied marine gastropod molluscs which shed their shells after their larval stage. They are noted for their often extraordinary colours and striking forms, and they have been given colourful nicknames to matc ...
, a shell-less
marine
Marine is an adjective meaning of or pertaining to the sea or ocean.
Marine or marines may refer to:
Ocean
* Maritime (disambiguation)
* Marine art
* Marine biology
* Marine debris
* Marine habitats
* Marine life
* Marine pollution
Military
* ...
gastropod
The gastropods (), commonly known as snails and slugs, belong to a large taxonomic class of invertebrates within the phylum Mollusca called Gastropoda ().
This class comprises snails and slugs from saltwater, from freshwater, and from land. T ...
mollusk
Mollusca is the second-largest phylum of invertebrate animals after the Arthropoda, the members of which are known as molluscs or mollusks (). Around 85,000 extant species of molluscs are recognized. The number of fossil species is e ...
in the family
Cadlinidae
Cadlinidae is a family of sea slugs, dorid nudibranchs, marine gastropod mollusks in the superfamily Doridoidea.
Molecular phylogenetic studies and their taxon-sampling schemes can have a strong influence of the resulting phylogeny. Research by ...
.
Distribution
The white Atlantic cadlina is found, dispersed in widely separated populations, on rocky bottoms from the
low tide zone to depths of 800 m, ranging from the Arctic to the North Atlantic (Canadian Arctic Archipelago,
Spitsbergen
Spitsbergen (; formerly known as West Spitsbergen; Norwegian: ''Vest Spitsbergen'' or ''Vestspitsbergen'' , also sometimes spelled Spitzbergen) is the largest and the only permanently populated island of the Svalbard archipelago in northern Norw ...
,
Iceland
Iceland ( is, Ísland; ) is a Nordic island country in the North Atlantic Ocean and in the Arctic Ocean. Iceland is the most sparsely populated country in Europe. Iceland's capital and largest city is Reykjavík, which (along with its s ...
,
Greenland
Greenland ( kl, Kalaallit Nunaat, ; da, Grønland, ) is an island country in North America that is part of the Kingdom of Denmark. It is located between the Arctic and Atlantic oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Greenland is t ...
). Along the North American coast its range reaches as far south as
. It also occurs along the European coast from
Norway
Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...
to northern Spain. The reporting of a ''Cadlina'' with yellow markings near the Portuguese west coast could be an unnamed species of Cadlina.
Description
''Cadlina laevis'' has a flattened, white, semitransparent, oval mantle. There appear to be two color varieties: one showing bright yellow spots near the thin, yellow margin on the back, the other is milky white and lacks spots.
There is also an intermediate form with milky yellow spots.
These forms do not seem to occur together: the yellow-spotted form lives in deeper water, whereas the other form lives intertidally.
The short, cephalic tentacles are comblike, and the short, tripinnate gills at the back are cryptobranchiate, i.e. they can retract at the same time in a common branchial pit.
The observed length of these sea slugs varies between 25 mm
[Gofas, S. (2010). Cadlina laevis (Linnaeus, 1767). In: Bouchet, P.; Gofas, S.; Rosenberg, G. (2010) World Marine Mollusca database. Accessed through: World Register of Marine Species at http://www.marinespecies.org/aphia.php?p=taxdetails&id=139134 on 2010-12-26] and 32 mm.
The maximum recorded length is 17 mm.
[Welch J. J. (2010). "The "Island Rule" and Deep-Sea Gastropods: Re-Examining the Evidence". '' PLOS One'' 5(1): e8776. .]
Ecology
Minimum recorded depth is 0 m.
Maximum recorded depth is 250 m.
This nudibranch preys on encrusting slime sponges, such as ''
Halisarca dujardini'' or, in deeper waters, the sponge ''
Dysidea fragilis
''Dysidea'' is a genus of sponge
Sponges, the members of the phylum Porifera (; meaning 'pore bearer'), are a basal animal clade as a sister of the diploblasts. They are multicellular organisms that have bodies full of pores and channel ...
''. They are reported to breed at the end of winter. The penis of the male is encrusted with tiny
chitin
Chitin ( C8 H13 O5 N)n ( ) is a long-chain polymer of ''N''-acetylglucosamine, an amide derivative of glucose. Chitin is probably the second most abundant polysaccharide in nature (behind only cellulose); an estimated 1 billion tons of chit ...
ous hooks. They reproduce by direct development. When the eggs hatch after ca. fifty days, they give small slugs, forgoing the planktonic larval stage. The
veliger
A veliger is the planktonic larva of many kinds of sea snails and freshwater snails, as well as most bivalve molluscs (clams) and tusk shells.
Description
The veliger is the characteristic larva of the gastropod, bivalve and scaphopod ...
phase occurs within the eggs.
References
* Johnson R.F. (2011) ''Breaking family ties: taxon sampling and molecular phylogeny of chromodorid nudibranchs (Mollusca, Gastropoda)''. Zoologica Scripta 40(2): 137–157. page(s): 139
Further reading
*
* Thompson T. E. (1967). "Direct development in a Nudibranch, ''Cadlina laevis'', with a discussion of developmental processes in Opisthobranchia". ''
'' 47(1): 1-22.
External links
The Sea Slug Forum: fact sheetPicton,_B.E._&_Morrow,_C.C.,_2010._''Cadlina_laevis''_[In/nowiki>_Encyclopedia_of_Marine_Life_of_Britain_and_Ireland.html" ;"title="n">Picton, B.E. & Morrow, C.C., 2010. ''Cadlina laevis''
n">Picton,_B.E._&_Morrow,_C.C.,_2010._''Cadlina_laevis''_[In
/nowiki>_Encyclopedia_of_Marine_Life_of_Britain_and_Ireland
{{Taxonbar.html" ;"title="n
/nowiki> Encyclopedia of Marine Life of Britain and Ireland">n">Picton, B.E. & Morrow, C.C., 2010. ''Cadlina laevis'' from=Q3170118
Cadlinidae
Gastropods_described_in_1767.html" ;"title="n
/nowiki> Encyclopedia of Marine Life of Britain and Ireland
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Cadlinidae
Gastropods described in 1767">n
/nowiki> Encyclopedia of Marine Life of Britain and Ireland
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Cadlinidae
Gastropods described in 1767
Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus