Sphaeronectes koellikeri Huxley, 1859

P. R. Pugh, 2009, A review of the family Sphaeronectidae (Class Hydrozoa, Order Siphonophora), with the description of three new species, Zootaxa 2147, pp. 1-48 : 45-46

Sphaeronectes koellikeri Huxley, 1859 (see Figures 16 & 17)

Sphaeronectes köllikeri Huxley, 1859, p. 50 , Pl. 3 fig. 4; Pagenstecher, 1869, Pl. 21; Chun 1885, p. 513; Agassiz & Mayer, 1899, p. 177, Pl. 16 figs. 51,52; Moser, 1924, p. 5, fig. 6; 1925, p. 97, text-fig. 4d; Trégouboff & Rose, 1957, p. 372, Pl. 76, fig. 9 [non fig. 10 copy of Fewkes, 1881, Pl. 6, fig. 12 as Diplophysa inermis ]; Smith, 1977, P1.30 fig. 164.

Monophyes gracilis Claus, 1873, p. 258 ; 1874, p. 30, Pl. 4 figs. 8–15; Chun, 1885, p. 514, Pl. 2 figs. 1–2 [non figs. 5–7 = Lensia subtilis ]; Mayer, 1900, p. 73, Pl. 27, fig. 89; Lo Bianco, 1904, p. 57, P1.36, fig. 148.

Diplophysa sp. Claus, 1874 , p.27, P1.4 figs. 1–4.

Sphaeronectes (Monophyes) inermis Fewkes, 1880, p. 143 , Pl. 3, fig. 6.

Sphaeronectes gracilis Chun, 1892, p. 84 , text-fig. 5; 1897a, p. 60, fig. 4; Schneider, 1896a, p. 603, text-fig. AA, Pl. 43 figs. 6, 9, 10; Mayer, 1900, p. 73, Pl. 27 fig. 89; Delage & Herouard, 1901, p. 283, fig. 423; Vanhoeffen, 1906, p. 12, fig. 5–6; Totton, 1965a, p. 202, text-fig. 138, Pl. 36 fig. 1,?text-fig. 137; C. Carré, 1968c, p. 86, Pl. I, fig. 1, Pl. II, figs. 1–4; D. Carré, 1969a, p. 32, Pl. I, 1–8; Palma, 1973, p. 52, Pl. 29; Daniel, 1974, p. 173, text-fig. 14C, D; 1985, p.291, text-fig. 78a,b; Kirkpatrick & Pugh, 1984, p. 126, fig. 56; Purcell, 1984, p. 315, figs. 3A, B; Pages & Gili, 1992, p. 100, fig. 44; Carré & Carré, 1995, p. 577, figs. 177B, 180H, 199; Pugh, 1999, p. 493, figs. 3.43, 3.54; Gamulin & Kršinić, 2000, p. 122, fig. 75; Bouillon et al, 2004, p. 230, fig. 142E; 2006, p. 484, fig. 231E; Zhang, 2005, p. 31, text-fig. 26.

Monophyes köllikeri Haeckel, 1888a, p. 34 .

Diplophysa truncata Haeckel, 1888a, p. 32 (in partim).

Diplophysa köllikeri Haeckel, 1888a, p. 32 ; 1888b, p. 108;? Agassiz & Mayer, 1899, p. 177, Pl. 17 fig. 53.

Sphaeronectes truncata Schneider, 1898, p.75 (in partim); Bigelow, 1911b, p. 184.

Sphaeronectes sp. Totton, 1954 , text-fig. 2B.? Diplophysa codonella Chun, 1888, p. 1154 ; 1892, p. 79, Pl. 8, fig. 2, Pl. 9, fig. 4; 1897b, p. 102.

non Sphaeronectes gigantea Bigelow, 1911b, p. 185 ; Moser, 1925, p. 97; Daniel, 1974a, p. 173; Palma, 1973, p. 53.

non Sphaeronectes gracilis [eudoxid] Bouillon et al., 2004, fig. 142F; 2006, fig. 231F (copy of Fewkes, 1881, Pl. 6, fig. 12 of Diplophysa inermis ).

Distribution: Sphaeronectes koellikeri was first described by Huxley (1859) from three individual specimens collected in the Indian Ocean, off the east coast of Australia, and in the Torres Strait south of New Guinea. It is the best known of all the Sphaeronectes species and has been found throughout the Mediterranean (see Gamulin & Kršinić, 2000), with numbers exceeding 18 m - 3 in the Adriatic, and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans. Like all Sphaeronectes species , S. koellikeri is very fragile and is most often collected in coastal regions, either by hand or in fine mesh nets fished at shallow depths. However, the species does occur in open water as it has been collected there, particularly close to the surface by SCUBA divers (Dunn et al., 2005; Pugh, personal data). Nevertheless observations of its presence in the Atlantic Ocean are few, ranging from the Gulf of Maine (Pagès et al., 2006) and off the west coast of Scotland (Fraser, 1967), the Canary Islands (Chun, 1885), to off South Africa (Pagès & Gili, 1991), where it was the predominant siphonophore species in the 20–100 m depth range. There appear to be no records for the South-west Atlantic but this probably is due to the lack of studies on siphonophores in that area. Mayer (1900) found it in the Gulf of Mexico, in the vicinity of the Dry Tortugas.

The records for Sphaeronectes koellikeri in the Pacific Ocean are similarly disparate. There are many records from off Chile (e.g. Apablaza & Palma, 2006; Palma, 2006, and references therein), where the species is abundant in superficial waters, with up to 3 specimens m -3. It also has a widespread distribution in the China Sea (e.g. Zhang & Lin, 1997; Zhang, 2005) and off Japan (Kitamura et al., 2003). Margulis & Vereshchaka (1994) have collected it in the Central Pacific , as did Bigelow (1911). The species was found to be abundant off south and Baja California , with large numbers being found off Santa Barbara and Santa Catalina Island (Purcell, 1981; Purcell & Kramer, 1983), and in Acapulco harbour (Bigelow, 1911). It is likely that, in these cases, the species has been carried north in warm inshore currents .

As previously discussed it is very likely that the records for this species, as Sphaeronectes truncata , in Monterey Bay given by Bigelow & Leslie (1930) actually refer to larval specimens of Lilyopsis medusa . However, Mackie (1985) has also observed " Sphaeronectes gracilis " from the submersible Pisces IV off British Columbia, Canada, but only at one of the 21 sites where dives were made. It was noted during both the winter and spring at depths between 70 and 140 m. One cannot say whether these observations actually refer to larval nectophores of L. medusa as if any specimens were collected none still exist (Mackie, pers. com.). However, the most likely conclusion is that his specimens belong to the shallowest living of the new species described herein.

Apart from Huxley's (1859) records Sphaeronectes koellikeri has been recorded in the Indian Ocean by Daniel (1985), who listed sporadic records for the Arabian Sea, Bay of Bengal, and off the west coast of Australia, and by Gibbons & Thibault-Botha (2002) and Patriti (1970) who found occasional specimens off South Africa and Madagascar, respectively. Pagès et al. (1990) also found it off Papua New Guinea.