Strange creature with red and green spots

RobynT

In Memoriam
I had a strange occurance where one of my fish went missing and I spent a lot of time looking for my large yellow tang or any part of it. In the viligant search for it with a flashlight, I came across a creature that I did not know I had in my tank. I have a 90 gallon that has been set up for over 1 1/2 years and I have added a few pieces of LR here and there but none recently.My guess is that I have 100 to 120 lbs of LR total.
When I first saw a glimpse of this creature, it was a worm like striped body in the crevice of a rock. It reacted to the light from the flashlight and slowly moved. I gently prodded it with a pipecleaner and it has a very hard shell. It was not there the next day but reappeared the next day. Last night my husband was able to get a shot of the "tail" or end of it many hours after lights out. I know the shot is not very good but was the best he could get in the dark. At first I was worried that it was a eunice worm, or a pistol shrimp of some sort. Now I wonder about maybe a nudi. I have no idea about the length, but the striped body that was visable on the first siting was maybe 3/4" around. Any ideas???
 
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What you are seeing in the picture is the "tail" of this creature, not the entire body. All I can tell you of the body that I have been able to see is that it is brown and beige striped, approx 3/4" round tube and hard shelled. My best guess is that the body is at minimal several inches long but that's all I have ever been able to see and it is in a deep crevice in the rock.
 
That's really one of the odder things I've seen, then. You'd almost think of the shape of a squid tentacle, except the ridges/segmentation and the fact it's clinging close to/crawling on the rock.
Maybe Leslie will have an idea.
 
This one comes up a lot. It's a chiton in the genus Cryptoplax which features very small shell plates nearly hidden by the rubbery mantle. In fact, Cryptoplax is latin for "hidden plates". There are several species. Not being a specialist I can't give you a species name. Like most chitons this is a grazer and accidental carnivore because it might eat small sessile inverts that are in its feeding zone.
 
Yep, that's the typical Tongan variation of Cryptoplax larvaeformis, although it might have come from somewhere else. People write about them retreating from light, but you may find them partially exposed on the reef in the daytime.

Cheers,



Don
 
It's amazing to me that I can spend as many hours a week, just staring at my tank creatures and yet find new things all the time.

Thanks for identifing my new tank guy! From running a search I was able to find a picture that looks exactly like mine. I'm sharing it for those that just like new information.

Cryptoplax larvaeformis

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It looks so much like my original picture it's unreal!
 
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