Lettuce sea slug

Lettuce sea slug

Lettuce sea slug

English name: Lettuce sea slug

Scientific name: Elysia crispata

Distribution: Lives in West Atlantic ocean and in the Caribbean seas.

Description:The lettuce sea slug is a colourful and beautiful species of marine slug. Though it resembles nudibranchs, it is not closely related to those gastropods. The slug is generally green and have curly edges. It gets its name for its appearance like a curly lettuce leaf. The adult can grow about 55 mm. Lettuce slug can be different in colours such as blue or pale colours with red or other coloured stripes.

Habit: It grazes on sea-algae.

Importance: The lettuce slug has drawn interests of biologists because of the presence of algal chlorophyll in its body, which it gets from it sea weed food sources. For this, it can make and provide itself with sugar.