Haliclona (Gellius) flagellifera Ridley & Dendy 1886

Haliclona (Gellius) flagellifera (Ridley & Dendy, 1886)

(Fig. 20, Tab. 16)

Haliclona (Gellius) flagellifera (Ridley & Dendy, 1886): Samaai & Gibbons 2005: 84–85, fig. 60, tab. 14.

Synonymy:

Adocia flagellifera (Ridley & Dendy, 1887): Burton 1938:7. Koltun 1964: 104.

Gellius flagellifer Ridley & Dendy, 1886: 333, 1887: 42, pl. 13, figs. 5, 10. Dendy 1922: 26, 1924: 320. Koltun 1959: 212, fig. 170. Boury-Esnault & van Beveren 1982: 111–113, figs. 34a–c.

Haliclona flagellifer (Ridley & Dendy, 1886): Burton 1959: 218.

Sigmadocia flagellifera (Ridley & Dendy, 1886): de Laubenfels 1936: 69. Bergquist & Warne 1980: 22–23, pl. 8, b. Pulitzer- Finali 1993: 327.

Material. 1 fragmentary specimen from station 048-1 (SMF 11838), 602.1 m, 70° 23.94' S, 8° 19.14' W, 12.01.2008. Material examined for comparison: BMNH 1887.5.2.252, holotype, Challenger colln., off Marion Island, 50–75 ftms., wet specimen; BMNH 1946.11.25.30 “Siboga” Expedition, Dutch East Indies, 1899–1900, from Amsterdam Museum, wet specimen.

Description. Specimen of station 048-1 (Fig. 20 A) fragmentary; shape of living sponge unknown. Largest fragment a blade-like structure, about 7 cm in diameter and about 2 cm thick, bulbous, both surfaces similar. Tissue very porous with large canals. A distinct thin epidermis with smaller pores covering the sponge; choanosome with large pores distinctly visible through dermal membrane. Color in ethanol brownish beige. Consistency quite tough, a bit brittle, inflexible.

Skeleton: Skeleton (Fig. 20 B) poorly organized, with a tendency to become anisotropic with primary tracts of about four oxeas, intercrossing poorly developed secondary tracts mostly made up of single oxeas only. Near the pores/cavities within the tissue, skeleton organized in an alveolate manner. Microscleres free within the choanosome. Epidermis very thin, a detachable monolayer of densely organized spicules.

Spiculation (Tab. 16): Main spicules almost straight oxeas (Fig. 20 C) with a mean length about 640 µm and a mean width about 26 µm. Ends of oxeas quite regularly blunt, almost resembling strongyles or styles. Additionally, very thin oxeas occur (Fig. 20 D), about 1 µm in width and length similar to common oxeas, likely juvenile, recently formed oxeas. Two types of sigmas occur, larger one (Fig. 20 E–F) very typical for the species, aberrantly bent around itself, forming almost a spiral, in average about 105 µm in length and width. Other sigmas common cshaped sigmas with length 25 µm and width 12 µm.

parameter SMF 11838 Ridley & Dendy (1887) Dendy (1924) Koltun (1964) Boury–Esnault & van

Beveren (1982)

Oxea I

Remarks. The species shows a quite remarkable variation in spicule size, as it is shown in Tab. 16. Most specimens reported have oxeas about 400 to 500 µm and flagelliform sigmas about 60 to 100 µm. Dendy (1924) reported a specimen with extraordinary short small spicules, e.g. oxeas about 210 µm. We have here examined a specimen with unusually large spicules, which generally reach significantly higher values than previously known, although highest values recorded by Boury-Esnault and van Beveren (1982) tend to similar dimensions. The relatively distinct differentiation in size categories between specimens led Bergquist and Warne (1980) to the assumption, that the species H. (G.) flagellifera in fact includes several species, which are commonly regarded as the same, because they all possess the very characteristic flagelliform sigmas. If that speculation would prove true, our new specimen with its large spicules may be regarded as a new species/variation within this complex. This could only be resolved by analysing much more material. It has to be mentioned here, that representatives of other species from the station 048-1 also show remarkably large spicules, especially the hexactinellids (Göcke & Janussen, this volume). This might be attributable to environmental factors, such as high Si-concentration, which were not measured at that station.