Family Aeolidiidae

Size to 80 mm; slug with large number of cerata, cerata curled distally. Color variable, light-pink to orange, ducts of digestive gland in cerata gray to brown. Feeds on sea-anemones, may assimilate cnidocytes (stinging cells) from the sea-anemones they feed on to use as their own defensive mechanism. Species widely distributed in tropical western Atlantic Ocean. Egg mass resembles thin noodles. Photo by Ángel Valdés. Egg mass photo (Kice Island) by Amy Tripp, 12/2011. (formerly identified as Spurilla neapolitana (delle Chiaje, 1844), the type species of the genus). This latter is restricted to the eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean Sea.

Body about 40 mm long, elongated, narrow, color cream-white. Head distinct, oral tentacles and rhinophores cylindrical. Lips present, protruded. Rhinophores short, bases close together, upper quarter black, but with light-colored distal extremities. Foot wider than body. Cerata elongated, gradually tapering to a slender distal extremity. Cerata with oblique black and yellow bands. This individual was photographed by Amy Tripp in 2009 on Kice Island, Collier County. The uncertainty in the identification ("cf" between the genus and specific ending of the species name) was suggested by Dr. Ángel Valdés (California State Univ., Pomona) because true C. tanna lacks the yellow color in its cerata.