Help I have a monster in my tank

[Marty48237]

Good Morning All,
Yesterday I saw a monster in my tank; it was munching on an encrusting gorgonian. It was about 1.5” long and 1”wide black mostly flat except in the center where its body is that has a white stripe along the top. The stripe gets wider when I bothered it. It came through a whole in the rock and when I poked it it slowly made its way back behind the rocks. Any Ideas as what this is? And how do I get rid of it.

Thanks for the help

Marty

[coral_diver]

I would say naudibranch of some sort from the description? Do you have a picture? I really dont want to tell you to pull it out by hand as some secrete poision into the water when disturbed also like with some worms they have stinging cells etc. We need to make sure what it is first. Does it have a shell of any sort? Really need a pic...

[Marty48237]

I have a digital camera wating when it to shows up again.
And yes it has a hard shell/body?the center of the creature under the black skin

[Sugar Magnolia]

Are you sure it was actually eating the gorg? I'd say, as soon as you find it again, pull it out and snap a few pics, post them up so we can ID it and tell you whether it is a harmful species or not.

[NewInTown]

its a key hole limpet and yep they will eat your gorg and.just about everything else. Their is a Sheld limpet that is all black and looks almost identical but will not bother coral and is safe for the reef but the key hole is not. I would wait untill its on or in a rock you can remove from the tank.
almost forgot the key hole is from the caribbean and the shield from Indo-pacific. where did your live rock come from?

[Marty48237]

Hi,

Finally got a picture see below. This critter is about 1.5"Long and 1"wide the center of its body is a hard shell under the black.

Thanks for the help in identifying it

Marty

[romunov]

Can you say Scutus? :D

[MikeS]

agreed...there is the culprit...

http://www.rfbolland.com/okislugs/scutungu.html

[coral_diver]

Very interesting!!! I wish it ate hydroids! It would be a neat addition to a tank without corals but then is that what they survive on solely??? Expensive diet! So part of the keyhole limpets=bad take it to the pet store...just kidding. Geeze the bad thing about the bad guys in out tank is that if I had something like that I would be making a species tank...I cant bear to kill anything no matter how bad it is not their fault we yanked what they were hanging around on or eating out of the ocean! If anyone ever has "pests" they want to have a home instead of flushing etc let me know I will take them if you are willing to ship them. I am going to keep my hydroid infested tank if that says anything about me...yep crazy.

[raynoldsk]

Okay, I think that is similar to what I just found in my tank.

It is about the size of a quarter, but stretches out into an oblong shape. It looks like a piece of satin material, and glides *very* quickly over sand, rock, coral--whatever. It doesn't really glide--it oozes, like lava. There are two small protruberances in what I take to be the front of the animal. It is translucent beige, with brown web-like markings all over the top. It oozed up onto the glass, and I could see no mouth on its underside.

Do I need to attempt to get this creature out of my tank? It's kind of neat to watch, although it has probably been there for months and I have never seen it before this afternoon and it has disappeared into the rock.

[Doctor_Reef]

What a neat critter.... Nice article also Mike!!!