Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society
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Epizoanthus fatuus is an azooxanthellate glass sponge-associated deep-sea crust anemone, its host is a glass sponge (Hyalonema spp.).
The colonies collected from great depths consisted of ten to 50 cylindrical polyps, all connected by strongly developed dark brown and light beige coenenchyma on stalks of Hexactinellida.
The column of preserved polyps were dark brown and light beige in coloration.
The colonies covered the upper part of the stalks of the Hyalonema sponges, but not around the spiny anchor.
The contracted preserved polyps were 0.8 - 2.9 mm in height and 1.9 - 3.6 mm in diameter.
The number of tentacles in each polyp was 28, and the tentacles were arranged in two rows.
Ectoderm and mesoglea of the polyps and coenenchyma heavily encrusted with numerous sand and silica particles.
Epizoanthus fatuus has been described in several studies indicating the presence of intraspecific variation (Andres, 1884; Lwowsky, 1913, Carlgren,1923).
Indeed, we observed several morphological differences, such as coloration and polyp dimensions between the two specimens studied.
Literature reference:
Hiroki, Montenegro, Javier, Santos, Maria E. A., Hoeksema, Bert W., Ekins, Merrick, Ise, Yuji, Higashiji, Takuo, Fernandez-Silva, Iria & Reimer, James D., 2022,
Evolution and phylogeny of glass-sponge-associated zoantharians, with a description of two new genera and three new species, pp. 323-347
in Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society 194 on pages 327-330, DOI: 10.1093/zoolinnean/zlab068, http://zenodo.org/record/5799592
The colonies collected from great depths consisted of ten to 50 cylindrical polyps, all connected by strongly developed dark brown and light beige coenenchyma on stalks of Hexactinellida.
The column of preserved polyps were dark brown and light beige in coloration.
The colonies covered the upper part of the stalks of the Hyalonema sponges, but not around the spiny anchor.
The contracted preserved polyps were 0.8 - 2.9 mm in height and 1.9 - 3.6 mm in diameter.
The number of tentacles in each polyp was 28, and the tentacles were arranged in two rows.
Ectoderm and mesoglea of the polyps and coenenchyma heavily encrusted with numerous sand and silica particles.
Epizoanthus fatuus has been described in several studies indicating the presence of intraspecific variation (Andres, 1884; Lwowsky, 1913, Carlgren,1923).
Indeed, we observed several morphological differences, such as coloration and polyp dimensions between the two specimens studied.
Literature reference:
Hiroki, Montenegro, Javier, Santos, Maria E. A., Hoeksema, Bert W., Ekins, Merrick, Ise, Yuji, Higashiji, Takuo, Fernandez-Silva, Iria & Reimer, James D., 2022,
Evolution and phylogeny of glass-sponge-associated zoantharians, with a description of two new genera and three new species, pp. 323-347
in Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society 194 on pages 327-330, DOI: 10.1093/zoolinnean/zlab068, http://zenodo.org/record/5799592
