New syntheses and new species in the Australian Ascidiacea
Author
KOTT, PATRICIA
text
Journal of Natural History
2003
2010-12-03
37
13
1611
1653
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00222930110104258
journal article
10.1080/00222930110104258
1464-5262
5260089
Synoicum macroglossum
(Hartmeyer, 1919)
Macroclinum macroglossum
Hartmeyer, 1919: 126
.
Synoicum macroglossum
: Kott, 1992a: 494
.
Distribution
. New records:
Queensland
(Mooloolaba, QM G308502; Swain Reefs,
QM G305755).
Description
. Both newly recorded colonies are gelatinous but firm on the surface. One is a vertical, upright cone with sand around the sides and in the base (QM G308502) and rounded, elongate or irregular elevations on the surface. The other is a
6 cm
slab about 1.5 cm thick with sand crowded in the basal half and small circular clumps of sand scattered sparsely in the surface of rounded surface elevations. Dark granular vesicles are in the sand-free upper half of each colony. Zooids, arranged along each side of short radial canals roofed over by a thin layer of surface test, open from the depressions in the surface which, in the Swain Reefs colony, are narrow crevices. Zooids are long and narrow with a long branchial siphon, a large atrial lip (with a straight fringed tip) arising from the body wall in front of the short atrial siphon which has small pointed papillae around the aperture. A small papilla projects from the body wall behind the atrial aperture. The small stomach has a smooth wall, the testis follicles are in a double row in the posterior abdomen.
Remarks
. Vertical colonies (QM GH5421, QM G308502), both from mainland locations on the
Queensland
coast, may be a different species from the cushion or slab-like colonies, although the zooids from each are identical.