Shrimp feeding on worms in Bonaire

[Aquapaul 26]

Hi,

My Wife found this shrimp on our last dive in Bonaire. It appears to be feeding on small white worms. We can't seam to find in our Paul & Ned books what either might be. The worms I would say are 2 or 3 mm long and the shrimp 8 to 12 mm long. The was shot with a 105 mm lens with a Macromate and then cropped some. She found it and several others later in sponges like the one pictured. I don't think they are that uncommon by the amounts of them we found after the first one just easily overlooked. Any ideas?

 

 

 

[Leslie 0]

Good photo Paul --the shrimp really don't like to come far enough out of the sponge to be clearly seen. It's Periclimenes harringtoni, commonly called the white-foot shrimp. Some Wetpixelians spotted it a few years ago & managed to get a few specimens off to a specialist for id. The full story along with some images was written up by Everett Turner http://wetpixel.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=44462)

 

It would be interesting to know if the shrimp actually does eat the worms or if it's just a room mate. Those are syllids in the genus Haplosyllis and they're almost always associated with sponges.

[Aquapaul 26]

Les Wilk's comparing them to the size of a carpenter ant is about right I would say. But, if you were to look in one of these sponges and not see one doesn't mean there aren't at least a dozen in there. Their bodies are nearly the same color as the sponge and the only give away is their white claws that resemble specks of white debris thats pretty much every where. I never saw the worms until I unloaded the images on my computer.

Edited February 11, 2013 by Aquapaul