Convoluta convoluta is a small acoel in the family Convolutidae. Native to the Baltic Sea, it invaded the Gulf of Maine in the late 1990s.
Diet and symbiosis It consumes juvenile settling mussels and harpacticoid copepods.Mamkaev, Y.V., Seravin, L.N., 1963. Feeding habits of the acoelous turbellarian Convoluta convoluta (Abildgaard). Zoologicheskii Zurnal 42, 197–205 It also engages in a symbiosis with a diatom of the genus Lichmophora,Apelt, G., 1969. Die Symbiose zwischen dem acoelen Turbellar Convoluta convoluta und Diatomeen der Gattung Lichmophora (In German). Marine Biology (Berlin) 3, 165–187 which has also invaded the Gulf of Maine.
Impact and ecology in the Gulf of Maine In the Gulf of Maine, the impact of this species appears minimal as the habitat is presumably saturated with food, and the species is ultimately self-limited by species competition.Byrnes, J.E. and Witman, J.D. 2003. Impact assessment of an invasive flatworm, Convoluta convoluta, in the Southern Gulf of Maine. Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology 203: 173–191 It also appears limited to wave-protected habitats, where it prefers filamentous algae. In 2001, it occurred in densities of up to 19 per square centimeter.
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