Tambja kava
Purple-tipped wrinkle dorid
Fiji · Pacific Ocen - Koro Sea
- Size
- 15 mm
- Native range
- Western Pacific; known with certainty only from Vanuatu.
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Description
A small polycerid dorid described in 2014 from a single specimen collected off Aoré Island, Vanuatu. The name refers to kava, the traditional drink of Vanuatu and Melanesia. Molecular data place it closer to Tambja species from Mexico and Brazil than to its Japanese look-alike.
Share link: https://seaslugs.org.il/species/tambja-kava-fiji-pacific-ocen-koro-sea/
Identification
Body uniformly green with numerous fine longitudinal reddish lines that give a ridged look, and a broken whitish line along the mantle edge. Rhinophores lamellate (about 16 lamellae) with dark violet tips; five short gill branches in a semicircle. The rear of the foot is also tinged dark violet.
Similar species
Tambja amakusana from Japan looks similar but differs in reproductive anatomy and radular teeth; reliable separation is anatomical/molecular.
Habitat & diet
Habitat
Tropical coral reef; depth of the type specimen not given.
Food
Not recorded; like other Tambja, presumably feeds on bryozoans.
