Worlds longest shrimp?

Found this today, not sure what it is. It was about 3 inches long and about 2mm thick, very long and thin. It appeared to be trying to climb into the polyp coral it was on. Kept them big so you can get a better look, sorry they are big.

Full shot:

Head Shot 100% crop:

Tail shot:

Leslie's going to love you for this one Patrick :-)

Cheers

James

MINE!!! IT'S MINE!!! GIVE ME THIS WORM OR I'LL SHOOT THE HAMLETS!!!!

Okay, I'm calm now..... Very nice images Patrick! B) Rather than a shrimp it's a polychaete in the family Syllidae, subfamily Autolytinae, and in the genus Procerastea. There are only a few species in the genus and they're easy to identify because they only have dorsal cirri (the white appendages) on one segment by the head. Nearly all other syllids have dorsal cirri on all segments. I'm fairly certain the species is undescribed and this is the first record of the genus in the northwest Atlantic/ Caribbean area that I'm aware of.

If you don't mind, I'd love to get high-res files of these images and send them to my friend Arne Nygren who's the world specialist on this group. He'll be totally jazzed to see them!

Thanks so much for posting (even if you did call it a shrimp )

Okay I've stopped laughing now Leslie, oh and James you were right!.

Yes if you PM me with your email I'll send you the high res, thanks for the ID. It was a very cool creature, I watched it for about 2 mins before I had to go, so small I nearly missed it.

I see Patrick going out nearly every morning and I am doing nothing with my time right now, I should get my camera and some dive equipment and go follow him around underwater, you've been nailing some cool critters this year.

Man you have a keen eye, always pulling stuff out the bag.

now that Leslie has calmed down we can go back to the original question:

WHAT IS THE WORLD'S LONGEST SHRIMP ???? I have a few ideas .. but let''s see some documentation first ! any input welcome !

ciao

Art

Oh, Art, you're just as shrimp-minded as I am worm-minded! I believe the original question was "is this the world's longest shrimp", not "what is the world's largest shrimp" but I forgive your crusty attitude!

In Mississippi The world's largest shrimp is on display at the Old Spanish Fort Museum in Pascagoula. Apparently (quick google)

however this article says there was a black tiger shrimp over 40cm long. claiming to be the largest, well the shrimp didn't claim that a biologist did.

Did google get me a good answer (you guys made me curious)

http://www.local6.com/problemsolvers/8755909/detail.html