Cornucopina infundibulata (Busk)

Hayward, Peter J. & Winston, Judith E., 2011, Bryozoa collected by the United States Antarctic Research Program: new taxa and new records, Journal of Natural History 45 (37 - 38), pp. 2259-2338 : 2265-2266

Cornucopina infundibulata (Busk)

( Figure 3 )

Bicellaria infundibulata Busk, 1884: 33 (part), pl. 6, fig. 2

Cornucopina infundibulata: Levinsen, 1909 , pl. 4, fig. 4a-d; Harmer, 1926: 429; Hastings, 1943: 399, fig. 28B

Material

Eltanin cruise 9, station 732, 53 ◦ 36’ S, 36 ◦ 51’ to 36 ◦ 54’ W, 220–265 m, 12 September 1963.

Other material examined

BMNH reg. nos. 1899.7.1.4567, 4569, 4570, SYNTYPES, Challenger Station 147, 46 ◦ 16’ S, 48 ◦ 27’ E, off Crozet island, 1600 fathoms (2926 m) .

Description

The single sample contained a luxuriant, tangled clump representing an unknown number of colonies. The autozooids are ordered in biserial arrangement. The opesia is oval with an obtusely angled distal corner; each autozooid bears two spines, arising from the basal wall. Fertile zooids are distinctive: adventitious, budded from the basal wall of an autozooid close to the axil of a dichotomy; slender horn-shape, the ovicell as large as the zooid, with striated, opaque endooecium. Avicularia very sparse, of two types: long, coach horn-shaped or shortly pedunculate.

The type locality is close to Crozet Island in the southern Indian Ocean , at 1600 fm (2926 m) depth. The present material was collected from 220–265 m depth off South Georgia. However, in all aspects of morphology and dimensions the USARP specimens cannot be distinguished from the syntypes of Busk’s species, especially in the structure of the fertile zooid. The morphology of C. infundibulata has been discussed or figured by several authors since it was first described, but no further specimens had been collected until now .

Figures

Figure 3. Cornucopina infundibulata, Eltanin (9) st. 732. (A) Part of a branch, bearing an ovicelled zooid; (B) part of branch in basal view, showing spine bases and origination of zooids. Scale bar: 0.5 mm.