The Exquisite Flamingo Tongue

The first time I ever snorkeled was off an abandoned island off the coast of Belize. It was 1985 and I was spending 3 months in Belize as part of Goshen College's Study Service Trimester. I will never, ever forget the first moment my mask went under the water. The vivid colors! The bizarre shapes branching up from the bottom! So many things vying for my attention! My friend, Jerry Hochstetler, who had just finished studying invertebrate zoology with me dove down below me and came up holding the most beautiful little shell I had ever laid eyes on. 

Cyphoma gibbosum

It's common name was as exotic sounding as the animal appeared: Flamingo Tongue. I marveled at the incredible pattern and colors of this inch long snail.
Many years would pass without me seeing my second Flamingo Tongue. Finally after leading many mini-term trips for Central Christian School, my brother-in-law, Von Schrock reported finding a Flamingo Tongue at Indian Key. Lake Center would be taking our very first trip just two weeks later. Flamingo Tongue would be at the top of my Most Wanted List! Our small group of guys was fortunate enough to find several of these gems that year and we have found Flamingo Tongue every time we have been to Indian Key since (but almost nowhere else).
The Flamingo Tongue's scientific name is Cyphoma gibbosum. It is from the Mollusca phylum in the class Gastropoda. Not all of the Gastropods have large external shells like Cyphoma does but when they do, they are created by a very important part of the snail's anatomy, the mantle. The mantle serves many important functions including secreting calcium carbonate which creates the hard outer shell which in turn provides safety for the soft animal to live in. The term "mantle" comes from the Latin word pallium which means "cloak" or "robe" because many Gastropods can extend their mantle, or robe, entirely covering over their shell much like a robe. Indeed, the brightly colored, polka dot pattern of the Flamingo Tongue is not the shell at all but the mantle extended out over the shell. Many a novice collector has unknowingly grabbed a Flamingo Tongue thinking they were taking a beautiful shell home only to end up with a relatively plain shell after the animal has died.

If you look closely at the above photo, you can see the mantle is slightly opened just at the peak of the shell. Here is a photo of some Flamingo Tongue shells; still quite pretty but not nearly so dramatic. These small snails feed almost exclusively on the polyps of the gorgonians, the soft corals. Often they are found on sea fans in the deeper reefs but in the shallower water of Indian Key we find them feeding on the genera Pterogorgia and Pseudopterogorgia. Below is a photo taken with a simple underwater point and shoot digital camera by student Hannah Horner last year at Indian Key.

Flamingo Tongue on Pterogorgia at Indian Key

 Notice in the photo that on most of the left side of the purple coral branches, you can observe the tiny yellow coral polyps which are the colonial animals that build the purple, branching structure you see. However, you can see that on the right side of the coral where the Flamingo Tongue is feeding, all the polyps are withdrawn, trying to avoid being eaten by the hungry snail. Normally there are few enough snails that they live in good balance with the corals but recently there was a population explosion of Flamingo Tongue in Puerto Rico that is putting the local soft coral population at risk. A video link showing this unusual problem can be found here
Cyphoma gibbsom is not the only species of Cyphoma that can be found at Indian Key. Two years ago at Indian Key, Central Christian's class had found an exceptional count of Flamingo Tongue there. Then two weeks later, Lake Center's class could find no live Cyphoma but oddly found 15 or 20 dead Cyphoma shells on ocean floor. However, we noticed that several of the shells we found were a bit longer and more white instead of the orange color Cyphoma gibbsom shows. A little research showed that these shells were the much less common Cyphoma mcgintyi, the Spotted Cyphoma and the following year we were able two discover two living Spotted Cyphoma with their snazzy mantles covered with purple polka dots bordered in red.

Cyphoma mcgintyi

Cyphoma signatum

Now we are in hot pursuit of the even more rare Fingerprint Cyphoma, Cyphoma signatum. Ice cream sundae for sure to the watchful diver who turns that one up!