Tsitsikamma scurra, Samaai, Toufiek, Gibbons, Mark J., Kelly, Michelle & Davies-Coleman, Mike, 2003

Samaai, Toufiek, Gibbons, Mark J., Kelly, Michelle & Davies-Coleman, Mike, 2003, South African Latrunculiidae (Porifera: Demospongiae: Poecilosclerida): descriptions of new species of Latrunculia du Bocage, Strongylodesma Lévi, and Tsitsikamma Samaai & Kelly, Zootaxa 371, pp. 1-26 : 20-21

publication ID	https://doi.org/ 10.5281/zenodo.156901
DOI	https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.6276879
persistent identifier	https://treatment.plazi.org/id/03FE87D7-6715-FF86-FEB5-FA97BA18EA10
treatment provided by	Plazi
scientific name	Tsitsikamma scurra
status	sp. nov.

Treatment

Tsitsikamma scurra View in CoL sp. nov. ( Figs. 3 View FIGURE 3 H, 4G, 6C)

Holotype material. BMNH 2003.1.10.3: Hout Bay, near the wreck of British “The Maori”, sunk in 1909, ~ 2.5 nm offshore and north of Hout Bay, west coast near Cape Town, South Africa, 34° 02' 16''S, 18° 18' 34''E, collected by Dr Patrick L. Colin, Coral Reef Research Foundation, 31 March 2000, 28 m (0 CDN 7364 O).

Paratype material. SAM H 4971: Hout Bay, near the wreck of British “The Maori”, sunk in 1909, ~ 2.5 nm offshore and north of Hout Bay, west coast near Cape Town, South Africa, 34° 02' 16''S, 18° 18' 34''E, collected by Lynden West, Scripps Institute of Oceanography, 25 January, 2003, 28 m.

Description. Sponge is massive, semispherical, sometimes thickly encrusting, up to 8 long, 4 cm wide, 5 cm high ( Fig. 3 View FIGURE 3 H). Texture, compressible internally with a relatively tough thick sandpapery ectosome. Surface crowded with large hollow straplike oscular fistules, 15–20 mm high, 14 mm wide at base and 5 mm high at apex, the apex slightly expanded. Scattered between oscules are numerous fungiform areolate porefields, 8–12 mm high, 2–4 mm wide. Colour in life lime green and in preservative dark liver brown.

Spicules. Megascleres— Styles: Slightly curved, thickened centrally, two sizes; 829 (774–882) x 24 m; thinner, slightly curved centrally: 669 (585–738) x 17 m. Microscleres— Isochiadiscorhabds (Fig. 4G): With three whorls of conicocylindrical tubercules, the apex of each tubercular projection is acanthose. The conicocylindrical tubercules project at 45 to the shaft in pairs: 41 (38–45) x 8 m.

Skeleton. The overall skeleton is dominated by a thick ectosomal envelope of tangential megascleres, 230–540 m thick, extending up into the large oscular tubes. Within the envelope is a much softer choanosome containing an irregular reticulation of wispy tracts of small styles ranging in width from 180–200 µm thick ( Fig. 6 View FIGURE 6 C). Microscleres are abundant throughout the choanosome.

Ecology. The sponge was found on a moderately rugged rocky outcrop beneath kelp about 150 m from a shipwreck, 28 m.

Etymology. Named for the appearance of the sponge, with elongate, flattened occasionally bentover oscular fistules, resembling the elongate tasselled extensions on a jester’s hat.

Remarks. Species of Tsitsikamma are very clearly differentiated at the morphological and skeletal level. T. favus Samaai & Kelly is turquoise, semispherical, extremely tough and multichambered, with short surface extensions, while T. pedunculat a sp. nov. is pinkishbrown, stalked and bulbous. T. scurra sp. nov. is lime green (preservativeliver brown), thickly encrusting, soft and compressible, with flat hollow oscular fistules. The morphology of the microscleres further differentiates these species.