A green sacoglossan to about 8 cm (3 in) with tall side flaps carrying a pale wavy margin, the body between them flecked white and dark. It feeds by piercing algal cells and keeping the chloroplasts alive in its own tissues, so like its relatives it is part animal, part solar panel.
It is also the species behind one of the strangest findings in recent zoology. In 2021 researchers watching this slug and a close relative recorded animals shedding the entire body behind the head - heart, gut and all - after which the severed head crawled off, fed within hours and regrew a complete new body over about three weeks. The discarded body kept moving for days. The likely trigger is parasite load: the head walks away from an infested body rather than dying with it. Nothing else among molluscs does this at that scale, and it happens in an animal a diver can find on shallow weed here.
- tall side flaps with a pale wavy margin
- green body flecked with white and dark spots
- flaps held raised rather than folded flat
- length up to 8 cm
