Koellikerina maasi (Browne, 1910)

Verhaegen, Gerlien, Cimoli, Emiliano & Lindsay, Dhugal, 2021, Life beneath the ice: jellyfish and ctenophores from the Ross Sea, Antarctica, with an image-based training set for machine learning, Biodiversity Data Journal 9, pp. 69374-69374 : 69374

Koellikerina maasi (Browne, 1910)

Materials

Type status: Other material. Occurrence : individualID: MCMEC2019_ Koellikerina _maasi_a; lifeStage: adult; associatedMedia: "http://morphobank.org/permalink/?P3993", "https://youtu.be/QiBPf_HYrQ8", "https://youtu.be/-BonvTRljY8"; Taxon : scientificName: Koellikerina maasi; kingdom: Animalia ; phylum: Cnidaria ; class: Hydrozoa ; order: Anthoathecata ; family: Bougainvilliidae ; genus: Koellikerina ; Location: continent: Antarctica; waterBody: McMurdo Sound; maximumDepthInMeters: 1; decimalLatitude: -77.637; decimalLongitude: 166.401; Identification: identifiedBy: Dhugal Lindsay; Event: samplingProtocol: Sony Alpha 7 III camera equipped with a FE 90mm F2.8 Macro G OSS lens; eventDate: 2019-11-26; Record Level: type: StillImage, Video; language: en; rightsHolder: Emiliano Cimoli Type status: Other material. Occurrence : individualID: MCMEC2018_ Koellikerina _maasi_b; lifeStage: adult; associatedMedia: http://morphobank.org/permalink/?P3993; Taxon : scientificName: Koellikerina maasi; kingdom: Animalia ; phylum: Cnidaria ; class: Hydrozoa ; order: Anthoathecata ; family: Bougainvilliidae ; genus: Koellikerina ; Location: continent: Antarctica; waterBody: McMurdo Sound; maximumDepthInMeters: 1; decimalLatitude: -77.637; decimalLongitude: 166.401; Identification: identifiedBy: Dhugal Lindsay; Event: samplingProtocol: NIKON D500 camera equipped with a TAMRON SP 90mm F2.8 Di Macro VC USD F017N lens; eventDate: 2018-11-27; Record Level: type: StillImage; language: en; rightsHolder: Emiliano Cimoli Type status: Other material. Occurrence : individualID: MCMEC2018_ Koellikerina _maasi_c; lifeStage: adult; associatedMedia: http://morphobank.org/permalink/?P3993; Taxon : scientificName: Koellikerina maasi; kingdom: Animalia ; phylum: Cnidaria ; class: Hydrozoa ; order: Anthoathecata ; family: Bougainvilliidae ; genus: Koellikerina ; Location: continent: Antarctica; waterBody: McMurdo Sound; maximumDepthInMeters: 1; decimalLatitude: -77.637; decimalLongitude: 166.401; Identification: identifiedBy: Dhugal Lindsay; Event: samplingProtocol: NIKON D500 camera equipped with a TAMRON SP 90mm F2.8 Di Macro VC USD F017N lens; eventDate: 2018-11-29; Record Level: type: StillImage; language: en; rightsHolder: Emiliano Cimoli

Distribution

Southern Ocean, in the McMurdo Sound ( Browne 1910, Foster 1989, Larson and Harbison 1990), off Adélie Land ( Toda et al. 2014), off Wilhelm II Land at Gauss Station (66.03°S, 89.63°E) ( Vanhöffen 1912), in Prydz Bay ( Hosie 1999a, Hosie 1999b) and in the Weddell Sea ( Kramp 1957a); New Zealand ( Bouillon 1995, Schuchert 1996); Madagascar ( Kramp 1965); Papua New Guinea ( Bouillon et al. 1988).

Notes

Original description after Browne (1910) (basionym Koellikeria maasi Browne, 1910) (Fig. 2 A-B): Bell-shaped medusa, with very thick, higher than broad (up to 9 mm wide and 10 mm high), umbrella with a rounded summit; four broad radial canals, adjacent to the ectodermal lining of the sub-umbrella, attached at the base of the stomach; radial grooves in the wall of the sub-umbrella, adjacent to the radial canals; large and cross-shaped stomach, interior covered with minute endodermal papillae, with a slender mesogleal strand running along the centre of the papilla; four dichotomously branched perradial oral tentacles inserted above the mouth rim, the number of branches increasing with age (two-three times dichotomously branched for young stage, at least seven times branched in adult stage), distal branches terminating with small nematocyst-covered cap; mouth circular and simple; four perradial gonadal masses, covering nearly entirely the outer wall of the manubrium; eight groups of solid marginal tentacles (four perradial and four interradial), the number of tentacles in each group increasing with age, with three to seven tentacles in the perradial groups and three to five tentacles in the interradial groups, the middle tentacle per group being the longest, with the middle tentacle of the perradial groups being longer than the middle one of the interradial groups; no ocelli present. Characters gleaned from species’ illustrations (for which the adult drawing was based on several specimens): mesogleal thickness between the ex- and sub-umbrella on the top of the bell ca. one fourth of the height of the ex-umbrella in young specimens and ca. half the height in adults; manubrium size ca. one third the height of the sub-umbrella in young specimens, ca. half the height in adults. Type locality: McMurdo Sound (78°49'S, 166°20'E), Antarctica.

Additional information from specimens from the Southern Ocean: from Gauss Station (0-385 m depth) ( Vanhöffen 1912) (Fig. 2 C), adult specimen preserved in formalin, 11 mm high × 10 mm wide, sub-umbrella 7 mm high × 8 mm wide, mesogleal thickness between the ex- and sub-umbrella on top of the bell of 4 mm (ca. one third of the bell height), stomach not on peduncle (i.e. “Magenstiel” in the German original version) 2.5 mm high × 4 mm wide, gonads separated perradially and folded interradially, stomach and tentacle bulbs red in living specimens, but turned yellow once preserved in formalin, no ocelli (i.e. “Ozellen”), oral tentacles five times dichotomously branched, perradial tentacle bulbs with seven marginal tentacles, with middle tentacle the longest (ca. three times longer and thicker than the surrounding second-largest tentacles), interradial bulbs with five dissimilar tentacles. Young specimen of 1 mm in length, beginning of mouth-tentacles present in little buds at the perradial mouth corners, colour of four perradial tentacle bulbs, stomachs and radial canals yellow, perradial tentacle bulbs with one middle-sized and two smaller tentacles and two weak indications of additional tentacles, four smaller interradial tentacle groups consisting of three tentacles and without indications of two additional tentacles; Weddell Sea ( Kramp 1957a), description matching the original one of Browne (1910).

Additional information on specimens identified as same species from outside the Southern Ocean: from west coast of Madagascar ( Kramp 1965), diameter 8 mm, height 9 mm, slight indication of a gastral peduncle, description otherwise matching with Browne (1910), Vanhöffen (1912) and Kramp (1957a); from Papua New Guinea ( Bouillon et al. 1988), gastric endoderm showing villi (also found in K. constricta , K. fasciculata , K. octonemalis and K. ornata ); from New Zealand ( Schuchert 1996) (Fig. 2 D), two specimens examined, 9 mm diameter, description similar to Browne (1910), except for the gonads, that formed irregular vertical folds, which may have been caused by the fixation.

Literature giving diagnostic characters without describing new specimens: Bouillon (1995), Kramp (1961), Kramp (1968), O'Sullivan (1982).

Description and comments on observed material (Fig. 2 E-F): N = 2 in 2018, N = 1 in 2019.

New undescribed characteristics: Ex-umbrella not smooth, showing small concavities and warts; the radial canals departing from the manubrium bend downwards, extending over four small perradial mesogleal convexities with ovoid yellowish nodules, before bending back up again to run over the ectodermal cavity of the sub-umbrella to the bell rim. These perradial mesogleal convexities are similar to those seen in the Leptothecate medusa Modeeria rotunda Quoy & Gaimard, 1827 ( Pagès et al. 2006).

Characteristics differing from previous descriptions: mesogleal thickness between the ex- and sub-umbrella on the top of the bell ca. one fourth of the height of the ex-umbrella, similar to the drawing of the New Zealand specimen of Schuchert (1996) (Fig. 2 D), but narrower compared to the descriptions by Browne (1910) and Vanhöffen (1912); manubrium size ca. one third of the height of the sub-umbrella, whereas ca. half the height for Browne (1910); triangular tentacular bulbs with tentacles arranged linearly as described by Browne (1910), whereas the diagnosis of Kramp (1968) mentions triangular bulbs in the text, but the dichotomous key (p. 35) reports them to be linear. We ascertain, based on the present live material, that they are indeed triangular.

Figures

Figure 2. Koellikerina maasi. A, B. Drawing from the original species description by Browne (1910) of a specimen in an early developmental stage (A) and an adult specimen (B) from McMurdo Sound, Antarctica; C. Drawing of a specimen (bell height 11 mm) from Gauss Station, Antarctica (Vanhoeffen 1912); D. Drawing of a specimen from New Zealand (Schuchert 1996, Suppl. material 1), scale bar 1 mm; E, F. Specimen MCMEC 2019 _ Koellikerina _ maasi _ a observed on 26 / 11 / 2019; apico-lateral (E) and oral-lateral (F) views. Pmc: perradial mesogleal convexity with ovoid yellowish nodule. E-F photos courtesy: E. Cimoli.