Ilyphagus pluto Chamberlin, 1919

Salazar-Vallejo, Sergio I., 2012, Revision of Ilyphagus Chamberlin, 1919 (Polychaeta, Flabelligeridae), ZooKeys 190, pp. 1-19 : 10

Ilyphagus pluto Chamberlin, 1919

Ilyphagus pluto Chamberlin, 1919:403; Hartman 1960:132.

Material examined.

Off Peru. Holotype (USNM 19721), 88 miles (141.7 km) SW Palominos Light House, R/V Albatross, Stat. 4672 (13°11'30"S, 78°18'00"W), 2845 fathoms (5206.4 m), 21 Nov. 1904.

Remarks.

This is a holothurian. The stout cylindrical processes forming a 'complete closed circle'from the original description are actually tentacles surrounding the mouth. Each tentacle is short and branched, but each branch is like a wart, making them apparently crenulated. The long, typical reddish brown chaetae found pen etrating the body belong to other, deep-water polychaetes, such as the aphroditid Laetmonice , which during dredging, frequently loose their chaetae. The holothurians belongs in the genus Meseres , currently in the family Synallactidae ( O’Loughlin and Ahearn 2005); after O’Loughlin (2002), two species have been described from the same region: Meseres torvus ( Théel, 1886) and Meseres macdonaldi Ludwig, 1894; however, the former species has an uncertain generic placement, whereas the second is retained in its genus ( O’Loughlin and Ahearn 2005).