This was Gary enjoying some algae after he was placed in the tall tank.

A few days ago, after an adventurous night snorkel session, we returned to the docks and found a Lettuce Sea Slug [Ed: The professors would like to note that this is a spotted sea hare, not a lettuce sea slug.  Good thing the exam on names isn’t for a few days!] sitting on the ramp we use to exit the water. Naturally, we picked it up and brought it to the wet-lab. We named it Gary. We brought Gary some algae for food and some sand a two mornings later. We found that it enjoyed escaping from its tank and going to the lower, shallower section of the wet-lab table. So we placed its food and sand in the taller tank, and as we were trying to pick it back up to put into the tall tank, an extremely concentrated jet of deep purple liquid shot out of Gary’s back, filling the entire area with a deep purple color.

Here you can see the deep purple color produced by our good friend Gary.

The three of us there at the time had no idea that they did this, so we thought we might have killed it. After brief and frantic paranoia, and confirmation from one of our professors that this was only a defense mechanism, we picked it up and moved it into the tall tank, where it seemed very happy to find sand and algae.

This is Gary the Lettuce Sea Slug [Ed: Nope, still not a sea slug, but a spotted sea hare], who we found at night and nearly stepped on when exiting the water after a night snorkel session.

Shane