Hypselodoris skyleri Gosliner & R. F. Johnson, 2018

Location: Ishigaki and Yaeyama, Okinawa, Japan
Date: 2017/02/15
Length: 10mm
Depth: 6.0m
Water temperature: 24.0℃

Description

Living animals are small, reaching 15 mm in length. The body is long, slender and translucent pink to peach, with fine parallel or intersecting brown longitudinal lines on the notum, sides of the body and foot. Small, scattered opaque white spots sit on small tubercles on the notum, sides of the body and foot. Scattered blue-purple spots also occur around the margin of the notum and foot, with denser pigment in the centre. Seven to eight unipinnate gill branches have a translucent white base and inner margin and bright red-orange pigment on the outer surface of the rachis and some gill filaments; the inner surface is opaque white. Bulb of the perfoliate rhinophores is opaque white with three red transverse bands and about seven to ten densely arranged lamellae.

Distribution

Known from the Philippines, Indonesia and the Marshall Islands.

Etymology

Named for Skyler (Sky) Rodgers, the son of co-author Rebecca Johnson. The bright white spots on the mantle are reminiscent of bright stars on a clear night, and the species is named in recognition of his curiosity about the stars.

Remarks

Hypselodoris skyleri belongs to a clade that includes Hypselodoris katherinae, Hypselodoris paradisa, Hypselodoris maritima, Hypselodoris rudmani and Hypselodoris bertschi, and is sister to H. katherinae and H. paradisa. The colour pattern resembles those of Hypselodoris maculosa and Hypselodoris decorata, but H. skyleri has brown rather than opaque white longitudinal lines, and opaque white spots are scattered over the surface of the body and elevated on small tubercles, whereas in H. maculosa and H. decorata the spots are found only on the margins and are flush with the body surface. There are three rhinophoral red rings in H. skyleri and H. decorata, but only two in H. maculosa. The type locality is Sea Pen, Tingloy, Maricaban Island, Batangas, Philippines.