Campanularia hincksii Alder, 1856

Gil, Marta, Ramil, Fran & Agís, José Ansín, 2020, Hydroids (Cnidaria, Hydrozoa) from Mauritanian Coral Mounds, Zootaxa 4878 (3), pp. 412-466 : 454-455

Campanularia hincksii Alder, 1856

Campanularia hincksii: Ramil & Vervoort, 1992: 233–235 , fig. 66; Cornelius, 1995b: 229–231, fig. 52; Medel & Vervoort, 2000: 28–30; Peña Cantero & García Carrascosa, 2002: 138–142, fig. 27A–B.

Material examined. MSM 16 /3, stn GeoB 14908–1, ROV, 17°40.213’– 17°40.191’N, 16°40.829’– 16°40.289’W, 463–574 m, 16-XI-2010: three colonies 10 mm high, one colony growing on Lophelia pertusa , one on a bivalve, one of them with gonothecae .

MSM 16/3, stn GeoB 14914–1, ROV, 17°08.203’– 17°07.898’N, 16°49.478’– 16°48.878’W, 417–514 m, 17-XI- 2010: six colonies 6–7 mm high, one on Acesta excavata , one on Aglaophenia lophocarpa and three on Sertularella gayi .

Biology. This species was collected from a wide range of substrates, such as rocks, shell fragments, algae, hydrozoans and other invertebrates; fertile colonies have been found throughout the year ( Peña Cantero & García Carrascosa 2002).

Our material was attached to scleractinian corals, bivalves and other hydroid species. Fertile material was found in November.

Distribution. Campanularia hincksii is a circumglobal species reported from Iceland to South Africa in the East Atlantic ( Peña Cantero & García Carrascosa 2002). In West Africa, it was collected from Morocco ( Billard 1906b; Patriti 1970; Ramil & Vervoort 1992; Medel & Vervoort 1998), Mauritania ( Billard 1906b; Medel & Vervoort 2000; Vervoort 2006; Gil & Ramil 2017a), Cape Verde Islands ( Medel & Vervoort 2000), Senegal (Vervoort 1959), Guinea-Bissau (Vervoort 1959; Gili et al. 1989) and Ghana (Vervoort 1959). Its bathymetric distribution extends from the tidal level to a depth of 1200 m ( Leloup 1940; Peña Cantero & García Carrascosa 2002).

Our material was collected from depths of 417 to 574 m.

Remarks. This is a well-known species and does not require further comments.