Notodoris minor Eliot, 1904

Yonow, Nathalie, Anderson, R. Charles & Buttress, Susan G., 2002, Opisthobranch molluscs from the Chagos Archipelago, Central Indian Ocean, Journal of Natural History 36 (7), pp. 831-882 : 842-843

Notodoris minor Eliot, 1904

(®gure 2f) Notodoris minor Eliot, 1904b: 84 , pl. 3, ®gures 1a±g; Wells and Bryce, 1993: 91, ®gure 106; see also Yonow, 1994a: 106, table 4.

Material. Chag96/36: preserved 103 23 2 mm; reacted with formaldehyde and covered in tiny globules; coll. A. JolliOEe in Salomon Atoll on 14 February 1996 on algae. Chag96/84a, b: 32 mm specimen from 23 m depth on sand (263 63 8 mm preserved, black-tipped rhinophores) and 21 mm specimen from 8 m depth on rubble (193 43 6 mm preserved, yellow rhinophores); south side of Nelson Island, Great Chagos Bank; third individual not collected; 3 March 1996. Chag96/86: 143 133 3 mm high preserved, reacted with formaldehyde; Middle Brother, Great Chagos Bank; 2 March 1996; at 17 m depth.

Description. The body was hard and nobbly, bright yellow with black lines and streaks: the longer, thicker lines tended to cross the dorsal surface almost perpendicular to the midline; the thinner, shorter streaks tended to lie at oblique angles to the midline (®gure 2f). Rhinophores medium yellow with black tips, the latter indistinct or absent in some specimens.

Geographic distribution. Indo-West Paci®c: from Zanzibar ( Eliot, 1904b) to Queensland and New Caledonia (Yonow, 1994a). In addition to this record from the Chagos, we have a new record from ReÂunion (colour slide by M. Parmentier; tips of rhinophores dark, perhaps green but not black).

Remarks. The three species of yellow Notodoris were reviewed by Yonow (1994a) based on a survey of the literature and on Paris and London museum specimens. Notodoris minor appears to be rare, and this record of ®ve animals from Chagos is unusual. Notodoris minor is normally very large, more than 100 mm in length, and the two juveniles present in this collection are the smallest specimens collected to date. Gosliner et al. (1996) record it as feeding on the yellow sponge Leucetta primigenia Haeckel, 1872 , whereas the two larger specimens here were found on sandy substrata and the smallest in algae.