Acryptolaria conferta var. minor Ramil & Vervoort, 1992

Gil, Marta, Ramil, Fran & Agís, José Ansín, 2020, Hydroids (Cnidaria, Hydrozoa) from Mauritanian Coral Mounds, Zootaxa 4878 (3), pp. 412-466 : 422-423

Acryptolaria conferta var. minor Ramil & Vervoort, 1992

( Fig. 2B )

Acriptolaria conferta var. minor Ramil & Vervoort, 1992: 43–48 , figs. 8a–c, 9a–c.

Acriptolaria conferta var. minor: Vervoort, 2006: 228 , fig. 11a–d.

Material examined. MAURIT-0911, stn MUDR01 , 16º08´24”N, 16º57´12”W, 488 m, 5-XII-2009: one colony, no coppiniae .

MAURIT-1011, stn MUDR20 , 16º08´11”N, 16º56´08”W, 405 m, 7-XII-2010: two colonies, one colony attached to Gorgoniidae indet, without coppiniae .

Biology. Colonies of A. conferta var. minor have been reported to grow on hard substrata like rocks, shell fragments, old antipatharian stems and coral fragments or as epibionts on Polyplumaria flabellata G.O. Sars, 1874 and other hydroids, gorgonians, soft corals and worm tubes ( Ramil & Vervoort 1992; Vervoort 2006). Acryptolaria conferta var. minor also colonises soft bottoms and anchors directly into the sediment with a basal tuft of hydrorhizal fibres ( Ramil & Vervoort 1992). Fertile material has been found in June and August ( Ramil & Vervoort 1992; Vervoort 2006).

In the material studied by us, one colony was found growing on the axis of a gorgonian.

Distribution. This variety is known in the Alboran Sea and Ibero-Moroccan Gulf ( Ramil & Vervoort 1992), Azores, south of Madeira, Canary Islands, off Cape Blanc du Nord and Cape Yubi ( Morocco) and off Cape Timiris ( Mauritania) ( Vervoort 2006). The bathymetric range varies between depths of 135 ( Ramil & Vervoort 1992) and 1835 m ( Gil & Ramil 2017a).

Our material was collected from depths of 405 to 488 m.

Remarks. The measurements of the hydrothecae is within the size range established by Ramil & Vervoort (1992) and Vervoort (2006) for A. conferta minor and separates this material from Acryptolaria conferta conferta ( Allman, 1877) . The two size groups, not bridged by intermediate forms, were also found by Gil & Ramil (2017a) in Mauritanian soft bottoms, which justifies, in our opinion, in maintaining it separate from the nominal species. Because of its sympatric distribution with A. conferta , this form only represents a variety and not a subspecies ( Vervoort 2006).

Figures

FIGURE 2. A, Turritopsis sp. (stn MUDR07), part of colony. B, Acryptolaria conferta minor Ramil & Vervoort, 1992 (stn MUDR01), part of hydrocladium. C–E, Filellum cf. serratum (Clarke, 1879) (stn GeoB 14908–1), hydrothecae. Scales: a, 0.5 mm; b, 1 mm; c–e, 0.3 mm.