Sipuncula from Hainan Island (China)
Author
Acd
text
Journal of Natural History
2000
34
2187
2207
journal article
1464-5262
Siphonosoma australe australe
(Keferstein, 1865)
Material.
Tielou gang,
28 March 1992
,
16 specimens
.
Description.
Trunk
116±210 mm
long and
12±16 mm
wide. Introvert,
160±210 mm
in length, carries hooks in rings, about
350
m
m in height (®gure 2a). Longitudinal bands of the body wall musculature are often visible through the skin. Nephridia are free. Contractile vessel with bulbous vesicles. Rectum is simple.
Discussion.
The bulbous vesicles of the contractile vessel which do not form villi (sensu Cutler and Cutler, 1982), the hook rings of the introvert and the absence
FIG. 2. (a) Introvert hook from
Siphonosoma australe australe
(Keferstein, 1865)
(scale5 100
m
m); (b, c) introvert hooks from
Gol
W
ngia (
Gol
W
ngia) elongata
(Keferstein, 1862) (scale5 50
m
m); (d) introvert hook with an associated papilla from
Gol
W
ngia (
Gol
W
ngia) vulgaris vulgaris
(de Blainville, 1827) (scale5 100
m
m).
of rectal caeca are characteristic of this species. The hooks exceed the measures given in Cutler (1994). However, Haldar (1991) reported specimens with hooks of
350
m
m in height. This, in turn, allows us to separate the investigated specimens from the other subspecies (
S. a. takatsukii
SatoÃ, 1935) hooks of which are shorter,
130± 140
m
m.
Siphonosom a a.
australe
shows a tropical and subtropical distribution. It is known from the Indian Ocean and from areas of the Paci®c Ocean. As the species was collected previously in the area investigated, there are records from Indochina (Leroy, 1942),
Vietnam
(Murina, 1989),
Hainan
(Chen, 1963; Li
et al.
, 1992a, 1993), and other parts of South
China
(Li, 1985a, 1985b). It inhabits, as all the species of
Siphonosoma
, sandy and muddy bottoms of the intertidal and shallow subtidal zones.
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