Paedoclione doliiformis

Species of gastropod From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Paedoclione doliiformis is a species of sea angel, a small floating sea slug, a pelagic marine gastropod mollusk in the family Clionidae.

Quick Facts Scientific classification, Binomial name ...
Paedoclione doliiformis
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Mollusca
Class: Gastropoda
Clade: Euopisthobranchia
Order: Pteropoda
Family: Clionidae
Genus: Paedoclione
Danforth, 1907[1]
Species:
P. doliiformis
Binomial name
Paedoclione doliiformis
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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

Thumb
Drawing of ventral view of live Paedoclione doliiformis.

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.

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]

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References

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