Noble Dorid
Peltodoris nobilis
Summary 6
Peltodoris nobilis, common names sea lemon, or the noble dorid, is a species of colorful sea slug, a dorid nudibranch, a shell-less marine opisthobranch gastropod mollusk in the family Discodorididae.
They are one of the largest nudibranchs in intertidal California, getting as big as a cell phone. They apparently can live much longer than most other species as well. The scattered black markings are on the body, not the papillae (as with Doris montereyensis, which also has yellow branchial plumes).
Description 7
This nudibranch is variable in color, from a very pale yellow through a rich yellow, to a rather dark orange. The gill rosette is tinged with white at the tips.
The dorsum is covered in tubercles. There are a number of dark spots on the dorsum, but never on the tubercles themselves. These dark spots vary a lot in number from one individual to the next.
This animal can grow to be as large as 200 mm, or nearly 8 inches in length.
A dark yellow Montereina nobilis crawling on red algaeMontereina nobilis, Moss Beach, CaliforniaMontereina nobilis with very few spots
Distribution 7
This species occurs in the Eastern Pacific Ocean from Alaska to Baja California. It eats sponges.
Sources and Credits
- (c) Robin Agarwal (ANudibranchMom on iNaturalist), some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), https://www.flickr.com/photos/30314434@N06/19863107552/
- (c) Robin Agarwal (ANudibranchMom on iNaturalist), some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), https://www.flickr.com/photos/30314434@N06/22655299404/
- (c) Ken-ichi Ueda, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), http://www.flickr.com/photos/18024068@N00/555423083
- (c) Robin Agarwal (ANudibranchMom on iNaturalist), some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), https://www.flickr.com/photos/30314434@N06/15767729068/
- (c) Robin Agarwal (ANudibranchMom on iNaturalist), some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), https://www.flickr.com/photos/30314434@N06/15559785592/
- Adapted by Robin Gwen Agarwal from a work by (c) Wikipedia, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peltodoris_nobilis
- (c) Wikipedia, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montereina_nobilis
More Info
iNat Map
| Color | black, yellow |
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