One balmy morning, when marine biologist Sri Chakra Pranav Tamarapalli and his teammates Vimal Raj, Manish Manick and Pavan Sai Varma were walking along the Rushikonda during their usual research trips, they stumbled upon a brilliant blue creature making its way through the rocky tidal pools. Fascinated by the colour and shape, they were quick to click pictures and videos. “Initially, we thought it could be a nudibranch sea slug; but upon close observation we realised it was very thin and had branched guts like a polyclad,” says Pranav.
The vibrant coloured benthic organism was a species of polyclad flatworm Pseudoceros galatheensis, recorded for the first in Andhra Pradesh and East Coast mainland India.
Marine flatworms, also called polyclads, are usually seen in nearshore areas in tropical and sub-tropical areas. They are predatory and mainly feed on marine organisms like sponges, ascidians, crabs and other smaller organisms. Their role is vital as predators in coral reefs and other shallow water marine ecosystems. Their brilliant colour warns other predators that they are toxic and should not be consumed. “Though there are many recorded species of polyclad flatworms around the world, very less is known about them in the east coast of India, where the records were not described until recently. This makes this discovery significant and underlines the need for research in marine biology along the east coast, which has several such surprises that need to be documented,” says Pranav, founder and project manager, East Coast Conservation Team (ECCT), who along with Greenpaw, established the first record of the marine flatworms from the region.
