(Montagu, 1815)
Description:
This slender and beautiful species may reach 48 mm in length with a violet-coloured body which immediately sets it apart from any other British nudibranch (although in the Mediterranean Sea there may be the possibility of confusion with Flabellina affinis ). The cerata are arranged in up to six latero-dorsal clusters and each ceras contains an orange-red digestive lobule. The tips of the oral tentacles, rhinophores and cerata are white (C. pedata).
Habitat:
This sublittoral species can be locally abundant, feeding when adult upon Eudendrium ramosum . There is some evidence that the juveniles may attack the hydroids Obelia geniculata and Sertularella gayi.
Distribution:
C. pedata has been reliably reported from sites all around the British Isles, to 40 m (Distr. C. pedata). Elsewhere, it has been recorded on European Atlantic coasts from Norway to the Mediterranean Sea (to Naples and the Adriatic).