Glossodoris cincta (Bergh, 1888)

Description

Dorsum and sides reddish-yellow with bluish-white dots densely scattered throughout; mantle margin and foot margin blue; rhinophores with brown stalk and blue club bearing bluish-white dots; oral tentacles blue; gill leaves with blue rachides.

The live animal measures up to 6 cm long when crawling, with a height and width of 1.5 cm. The rhinophore club bears about 24 leaves; the gill consists of six larger anterior leaves with a tuft of eight smaller leaves on each side. The wavy mantle margin is deep black all around, as is the foot border; the sole is yellowish. Black spots like those of the dorsum surround the rhinophore pits and gill opening. The rhinophore stalks are dirty yellowish, the clubs dark grey-black with numerous white dots along the leaf edges. The inner sides of the gill rachides and the gill tips are deep velvety black with bluish sheen, the leaves scattered with white dots; the outer side of the gill is yellowish only at its base. The tip of the anal papilla is blackish; the oral tentacles are velvety deep black.

Distribution

Type locality: Ile Marianne (near the Fouquets reef), off Mauritius, Indian Ocean. Western Indian Ocean.

Etymology

The specific epithet cincta is the feminine past participle of Latin cingere ("to gird, encircle"), meaning "girdled", in reference to the conspicuous mantle border that is deep black all around.

Remarks

The species was described as a western Indian Ocean form distinct from Casella atromarginata of the eastern Indo-Pacific. Casella was subsequently subsumed into Glossodoris, establishing the current combination; the parentheses in the author citation reflect this transfer.

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References

• Casella cincta, Bgh. n. sp., Bergh R. (1888). Nudibranchien vom Meere der Insel Mauritius. In: Semper C. (ed.), Reisen im Archipel der Philippinen. II. Wissenschaftliche Resultate. Bd. II, Abt. II (Malacologische Untersuchungen Bd. III), Heft XVI: 755-814. Wiesbaden: C.W. Kreidel's Verlag.
• Glossodoris cincta (Bergh, 1888), Rudman W.B. (1986). The Chromodorididae (Opisthobranchia: Mollusca) of the Indo-West Pacific: the genus Glossodoris Ehrenberg (= Casella, H. & A. Adams). Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society. 86(2): 101-184.
• Glossodoris cincta, Johnson R.F. & Gosliner T.M. (2012). Traditional taxonomic groupings mask evolutionary history: a molecular phylogeny and new classification of the chromodorid nudibranchs. PLoS ONE 7(4): e33479.
• Glossodoris cincta, Terrence Gosliner, Ángel Valdés and David Behrens. (2018). Nudibranch and Sea Slug Identification Indo-Pacific 2nd Edition. New World Pubns Inc.