Beware hitchhiker nudibranchs: wolf in sheeps clothing

[ReefRob]

It was the strangest thing. I'd had my second shipment in for about 2 weeks then one morning, for the first time, we saw the cutest little whitish nudibranch/sea slug crawling around the live rock. It has little curly things all over and two little antennae.
Later that night we watched it wander right into the Flower Anemone TBS send and croak ... very sad.

Last night we saw another one yippee! By noon it had made a bee-line straight for the Condy anemone. It is funny now: my wife trying to shield the poor little innocent nudibranch from the giant stinging anemone. I popped by at lunch expecting to find the lifeless body of the little nudibranch under the towering Condy. Not exactly ... that little turd is munching the Condy! It tore a big hole in the base and is sucking it down like an invert margarita!

I'll try to attach a pic tonight (haven't figured out how to deal with the size limit yet) but if you value your anemones, be on the lookout for cute little nudiwolves in lambs clothing.

 

[Bax]

Ouch!

Anemone juice must be like the moonshine of the reef, huh?

Regrets for your condy.

 

[boyooso]

that's wild...We'll maybe not considering that some nudibranhs eat aptasia exclusively.

What color is the nudi?

If you have a website you can put the photo on, you can put a link to a photo of anysize in the thread.

 

[boyooso]

P.S.

Sorry to hear about your condy :-(

 

[Talonn]

I don't know if I am lucky or not but I did not receive any anemones with my 35 gal package . Looks like it saved my 2 strange creatures...One looks like a Greek Goddess slug and the other I have no idea what it is.... maybe some one can ID these for me.

Chris

 

[ReefRob]

Talonn, those look different than my little rogue. Can't help with the ID's.

Don't feel too bad about the lack on anemones. I was thinking of giving them away anyway. They wandered a lot and stung a lot of coral polyps along the way. Plus, I didn't trust them with the perching fish I plan to get. I didn't want to see them killed but ...

 

[ReefRob]

Pics on my hitch hiker anemone finally

Pics on my hitch hiker anemone finally

I finally got around to posting a pic. After she sucked my Condy dry she went to the back wall and laid a really cool spiral of eggs. She has stayed nearby ever since.

I posted this on Dr. Ron's forum for an ID but thought you folks might be interested if you see one in your tank.

 

[christsoldiers]

This is not at all uncommon. I always laugh (quietly ) when I see a nudi with an anemone at the LFS. What he is doing is steling the anemoe's mojo! They have a weird ability to transfer the stinging abilities of the anemone to their "crown" and so it is a sort of defensive mechanism. I guess a slug needs all the defense it can get!

 

[ReefRob]

Interesting ... and there we were desperately trying to shield the poor unwitting nudi from the Condy ... learning something new everyday with this hobby.