Thorunna punicea (Rudman, 1995)

Thorunna punicea

No field photograph submitted for this species yet

Description

A small chromodorid, holotype 12 mm long alive. The mantle is bluish purple with a pinkish tinge anteriorly between the rhinophores. A thin opaque white line runs right along the mantle edge. The rhinophore stalk is wine-red, the colour diffusing onto the basal part of the club; the rest of the club is yellow, the uppermost few lamellae purplish-red, with a translucent clear knob at the tip. The simple gills are translucent clear with a yellowish tinge; their outer edge is orange on the basal half and red on the upper half, with red coloration along the inner edge of each gill. There are eight simple gills in a circlet open posteriorly around the anus, the two posterior gills smaller than the others. The gills vibrate rhythmically as the animal crawls, and there are no clear signs of mantle glands in either living or preserved specimens.

Distribution

Type locality: Channel, Passe de Koumac, 20°40.7'S 164°14.7'E, NW New Caledonia, 66–87 m, dredged in mixed shell sand and mud (holotype 12 mm alive, 24 October 1993, AM C200618). Subsequent records from Madagascar, Papua New Guinea and Japan.

Etymology

The specific epithet punicea, from the Latin for "pink", refers to the colour of the mantle.

Remarks

Originally described in Hypselodoris, but the derived reproductive characters (thin elongate vaginal duct, large receptaculum seminis) led to its transfer to Thorunna.
Rudman also noted that Chromodoris rosans Bergh, 1889 from Mauritius is "almost identical" in colour to this species.