Aegires villosus Farran, 1905
- Location
- Sunabe Water Treatment Plants, Okinawa Island (Chatan and Southern area), Okinawa, Japan
- Date
- 2014/05/07
- Length
- 9mm
- Depth
- 8.0m
- Water temperature
- 23.0℃
Description
A small phanerobranch dorid reaching about 12 mm in length. Body milky white as ground colour, with reddish-purple to orange-yellow markings or stripes; the dorsum bears clavate (clubbed) tuberculate processes whose tips are reddish-purple to orange-yellow. The medio-dorsal bunch of long clavate tubercles surrounds the branchial pore (two of them slightly branched), with two irregular lateral rows of slightly clavate tubercles on each side and additional small tubercles crowded on the neck. Longitudinal patches of purplish-brown pigment lie between the dorsal and lateral tubercles. The body and tubercles are densely spiculose, the projecting spicules giving the animal a pilose ("villous") appearance under slight magnification. Rhinophore sheaths bear three outer long tubercles and one small inner tubercle.Distribution
Indian Ocean, western and southern Pacific. Records include Tanzania, Sri Lanka, Australia, New Caledonia, Papua New Guinea, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines, Japan and Samoa. The type locality is north-west of Cheval Paar, Gulf of Manaar, Ceylon (Sri Lanka).Etymology
The specific epithet villosus is the Latin for "shaggy" or "covered with hair-like processes" (from villus, "shaggy hair"), in reference to the densely spiculose body surface that gives the animal its hairy appearance.Remarks
Originally described by Farran in 1905 within Herdman's Report to the Government of Ceylon on the pearl oyster fisheries of the Gulf of Manaar (Part III, Suppl. 21). At the time of description, the genus Aegires Lovén, 1844 had been known only from the Atlantic and Mediterranean; this represented the first Indo-Pacific record of the genus. The holotype was an immature specimen.References
- Aegires villosus, Farran G.P. (1905). Report on the Opisthobranchiate Mollusca collected by Professor Herdman, at Ceylon, in 1902. In: Herdman W.A. (ed.) Report to the Government of Ceylon on the pearl oyster fisheries of the Gulf of Manaar, with supplementary reports upon the marine biology of Ceylon. Royal Society, London. Part III, Suppl. 21: 329-364, pls. I-VI.
- センヒメウミウシ（新稱）, 生物學御研究所編. (1955). 相模湾産後鰓類図譜〈補遺〉. 岩波書店.
- センヒメウミウシ, 益田一. (1999). 海洋生物ガイドブック. 第2刷. 東海大学出版会.
- センヒメウミウシ, 小野篤司. (1999). ウミウシガイドブック. TBSブリタニカ.
- センヒメウミウシ, 殿塚孝昌. (2003). ウミウシガイドブック〈3〉. TBSブリタニカ.
- センヒメウミウシ, 小野篤司. (2004). 沖縄のウミウシ. ラトルズ.
- センヒメウミウシ, 中野理枝. (2004). 本州のウミウシ. ラトルズ.
- センヒメウミウシ, 小野篤司 & 加藤昌一. (2009). ウミウシ. 誠文堂新光社.
- Aegires villosus, Terrence Gosliner, Ángel Valdés and David Behrens. (2015). Nudibranch and Sea Slug Identification Indo-Pacific. New World Pubns Inc.
Featured in this book
Terrence Gosliner, Ángel Valdés and David Behrens. (2018). Nudibranch and Sea Slug Identification Indo-Pacific 2nd Edition. New World Pubns Inc.
New World Publications
This species, Aegires villosus, is included in the book.
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Tag:
Same Genus Nudibranchs
Similar Colors Nudibranchs
Academic Database
Sea slug observation data is available in international marine biodiversity databases.