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Paedoclione
Species of gastropod From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Paedoclione doliiformis is a species of sea angel, a small floating sea slug, a pelagic marine gastropod mollusk in the family Clionidae.
Paedoclione doliiformis is the only species in the genus Paedoclione.[2]
The generic name is a reference to the paedomorphic habit of this genus, which retains many larval features throughout its life.[3]
Paedoclione doliiformis was originally described by Charles Haskell Danforth in 1907.[1] It was not collected by zoologists for the next 61 years.[4] It was rediscovered in 1968 by Lalli (1972).[4]
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Distribution
The type locality of Paedoclione doliiformis is Casco Bay, Portland, Maine.[1]
The distribution includes St. Margarets Bay, Nova Scotia, the Gulf of Maine[3][4] and possibly elsewhere.
Description
Paedoclione doliiformis retains juvenile (larval) physical characteristics for the whole of its life.[4] This is called neoteny (a kind of pedomorphosis).[4]
The body length is up to 1.5 mm.[2] Paedoclione doliiformis has no shell.[2]
It is a gelatinous, mostly transparent pteropod, and it only has a shell in its embryonic stage.[citation needed]
The orange visceral sac is confined to the anterior part.
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Life cycle
Mating is carried out ventrally for mutual fertilization. The following spring, this results in a free-floating, gelatinous egg mass.
Eggs hatch after three days, and the shell is retained until the 11th day.[3]
Feeding habits
Paedoclione doliiformis feeds exclusively on Limacina helicina and on Limacina retroversa, but solely on juveniles with shells smaller than 1 mm.[5] Its abundance is closely linked to that of its prey.[3]
References
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