On some sea cucumbers (Echinodermata: Holothuroidea) from off the south and west coasts of South Africa collected by the South African Environmental and Observation Network (SAEON)
Author
Thandar, Ahmed S.
Author
Rambaran, Ryan
text
Zootaxa
2015
3999
1
41
61
journal article
10.11646/zootaxa.3999.1.3
6bd3a3e2-ea99-490e-a64d-fbad37df8aa5
1175-5326
289200
1FE7AFED-DC04-4E8C-BFB3-880A94B296DB
Pseudocnella insolens
(
Théel, 1886
)
(
Figs. 10
)
Cucumaria insolens
Théel, 1886
:70
, pl. 4, fig. 5.
Pseudocnella insolens
;
Thandar,1987
:289
, figs. 1a, 2, 5a–c (synonymy);
Thandar, 2008
: 22
(partim).
Diagnosis
(See
Thandar 1987
).
Material examined
. A31605, South Coast Survey 2011, off Mossel Bay and Plettenberg Bay,
34° 25'S
,
22° 52'E
), Demersal Trawl 026-3448, Cruise
273, 102 m
,
16/04/2011
, Lara Atkinson, 2 spec; A31610, South Coast Survey 2011, off Plettenberg Bay,
34° 9'S
,
23° 24'E
), Trawl 031-2271, Cruise
273, 75 m
,
17/04/2011
, Lara Atkinson, 4 spec.
Distribution
(after
Thandar 2008
). Luderitz (
Namibia
) to Port Elizabeth (
South Africa
),
0–
110 m
.
Remarks.
This is a well-known southern African endemic previously much confused with other congenerics but this controversy was cleared up by
Cherbonnier (1952)
and
Thandar (1987)
.
Natasen Moodley (2000)
, analysed the ossicles of several forms and this was summarised by
Thandar (2008)
. No brood pouches described for the species by
Cherbonnier (1952)
and
Thandar (1991)
were observed.
A species of some contention is
Cucumaria leonina
var.
africana
described by
Britten (1910)
from Luderitz (
Namibia
) and assigned to the genus
Pseudocnus
by
Panning (1949)
. This species, never found again, was erroneously relegated to the synonymy of
Pseudocnella insolens
by
H.L. Clark (1923)
and this was reiterated by
Deichmann (1948)
,
Cherbonnier (1952)
and
Thandar (1987
,
1991
). It is here recommended that Panning’s (1962) re-description of Britten’s species as
Pseudocnus dubiosus africanus
,
presumably from
type
material, must be upheld until a revision of the genus
Pseudocnus
, currently in progress, is completed.