Caribbean Spanish Dancer

The Caribbean Spanish dancer is a nudibranch or sea slug, a mollusc with no hard shell, known from the Caribbean and Western Central Atlantic, where it lays its egg ribbons on the sand.

Opisthobranchs are the group that takes in nudibranchs. The name nudibranch means naked gills. All opisthobranchs are hermaphrodites.

These slugs are usually brilliantly coloured, and those colours alone can be enough to warn off predators. Some have stinging cells in their tentacles that give off acid, while others release acid from cells in the mantle.

Nudibranchs move slowly, although they can swim, or be carried along by muscle contractions or by the millions of tiny hairs on the underside of their fleshy foot. They have a huge appetite and feed using a rasp-like tongue.