In my defense this was a relatively small slug. Well, small by SCUBA standards, so maybe 2 cm, which is quite large by CA tidepooling standards.
Wonderful animals, but those antennae just kill me. Like silk ribbon on a geriatric dinosaur.
This was one of those times when David pointed into a dark hole, I gazed in for several seconds, saw nothing, but took a picture hoping I would capture whatever he had found.
"Members of the genus Actinopyga […] have an anus ringed with five inward-pointing teeth"
This is actually a pretty big fish.
A giant that deserved a scale object. Alas.
Halgerda terramtuentis, to be exact, aka the Gold Lace Nudibranch, aka that slug I've wanted to see ever since I first saw a picture of it. Between dives David and Randy asked if there was anything in particular I wanted to see, to which I replied "Halgerda!" Several miniutes into our second dive David pointed one out. Amazing.
It took about three people pointing to this before I understood it wasn't more algae. Unreal camo.
Somewhat more satisfying than the pic I took of this species earlier in the week.
