Identity Help Please

[CajunDiva]

Hi Scubaboard buddies. Today I was diving Calvin's Crack and came across this interesting specimen. I know it is a tunicate of some sort...can anybody help with identifying it (Cuda I'll bet you can name it without even looking it up )

By the way, the nitrox system was installed today by Aqua Adventures at Media Luna Resort...guess who gets to be the first to try it out??? One more step in the building process is complete

 

[scuba e]

Painted Tunicate. Love those things.

 

[Sloeber]

With as many times as you've been to the Bay Islands surely this isn't your first time seeing these tunicates, is it? You can find them in several color variants around the islands -

 

[CajunDiva]

Actually this is the first time I have run across this...I have never seen them diving Roatan - but the next day I saw tons of them at Cayos Cochinos. Guess I'll have to be more observant in the future

 

[RTBDiver]

I guess the divemasters and shop folks aren;t real big on identifying the things in the sea they show to folk, Maybe someone should donate a reef ID book to them

 

[Doc]

Actually this is the first time I have run across this...I have never seen them diving Roatan - but the next day I saw tons of them at Cayos Cochinos. Guess I'll have to be more observant in the future

I guess the divemasters and shop folks aren;t real big on identifying the things in the sea they show to folk, Maybe someone should donate a reef ID book to them

CDiva: It's all in the picking. (resistance is futile, you will be assimilated)

BTW:

You can tune a guitar,
You can tune a radio,
But you can't Tunicate.

Believe it or not, here's a related critter- a bivalve something or the other...

 

[CajunDiva]

I have seen the bi-valve something or others, but have not seen the little tunicates until this trip. They were like little bouquets...beautiful

 

[RTBDiver]

Over near Guanaja there is a dive site named Blue Bell wall, or something like that, it is covered in the little blue tunicates, I have seen lots around Roatan but nothing compared to around Guanaja or Cayos but I am sure there are places

 

[rob@diveinutila.com]

Gotta love a tunicate - such a confused creature! Starts life with a primitive backbone and brain

metamorphoses into it's adult form basically digesting it's own brain and backbone as it does it. Then it starts to have more in common with plants, fungii & bacteria than vertebrates; metabolizing cellulose to make their siphon. It gets weirder - about 80% of the genes of a tunicate are also found in humans...

You can read more at tunicates.com which is also where the picture is from.

 

[rob@diveinutila.com]

I think bivalves are all molluscs, clams, etc with two hinged shells... I'm sure someone can elaborate on that or correct me.
I think (I keep saying "I think" 'cause I'm no expert) the thingy in the movie must be a large tunicate.