Excysting worm!

​Last evening, I experimentally excysted some trematode metacercarial cysts taken from a mud crab, Rhithropanopeus harrisii. As I was watching them under the microscope, I got to see a worm excyst before my very eyes. Super cool (to me at least)! :) The species of trematode is a little bit of a mystery (which we have deemed a "meta mystery"), but we think it is likely Gynaecotyla adunca, a microphallid trematode that uses the eastern mudsnail, Ilyanassa obsoleta, as its first-intermediate host.