Zoantharia stet.

Fassbender, Nico, Stefanoudis, Paris V, Filander, Zoleka Nontlantla, Gendron, Gilberte, Mah, Christopher L, Mattio, Lydiane, Mortimer, Jeanne A, Moura, Carlos J, Samaai, Toufiek, Samimi-Namin, Kaveh, Wagner, Daniel, Walton, Rowana & Woodall, Lucy C, 2021, Reef benthos of Seychelles - A field guide, Biodiversity Data Journal 9, pp. 65970-65970 : 65970

Zoantharia stet.

Materials

Type status: Other material. Taxon: scientificName: Zoantharia; kingdom: Animalia; phylum: Cnidaria; class: Anthozoa; order: Zoantharia; scientificNameAuthorship: Gray, 1832; Location: waterBody: Indian Ocean; country: Seychelles; locality: Aldabra N 1, Aldabra W 1, Alphonse N 1, Astove W 1, Desroches S 1, Poivre E 1 ; minimumDepthInMeters: 8.8 m; maximumDepthInMeters: 31.5 m; locationRemarks: First Descent : Seychelles Expedition ; Identification : identifiedBy: Nico Fassbender , Paris Stefanoudis ; dateIdentified: 2019, 2020; identificationRemarks: identified only from imagery; Event : samplingProtocol: Submersible OR Remotely Operated Vehicle OR SCUBA; Record Level: basisOfRecord: Human observation

Notes

Colonies thickly encrusting to massive. Conspicuous, elliptical to round polyps, typically discernible underwater. Colour shades of creamy-white. Maximum recorded size: 50 cm across. This group likely contains a variety of species that are difficult to identify from video footage; hence, no attempt was made to identify them at a lower taxonomic level. Zoanthids can be distinguished from other Anthozoans by their tendency to incorporate sand and small pieces of the substrate into their tissue (Fig. 106).