Reteporella pelecanus, Lopez de la Cuadra & Garcia-Gomez, 2001

López De La Cuadra Car Los G Ar Cía Góm Ez, Los M., 2001, Mediterranean, collected by`Fauna IbeÂrica’ expeditions, Journal of Natural History 35 (11), pp. 1717-1732 : 1727-1730

Reteporella pelecanus n. sp.

(gure 4A–C, table 4)

Material

HOLOTYPE: M N CN 25.03 /1251. Part of a colony, ovicellate, coated for SEM. Fauna III sta. 216 A. Near Mahón Island (Baleares). Trawling from point 39ss50.59¾N, 4ss24.53¾E to point 39ss50.10¾N, 4ss24.60¾E, 119 m depth, 30 June 1994.

Other material. Fauna III: MNCN 25.03 /1252. Piece of colony, non-ovicellate, with base and growing edge, 14 mm high. Sta. 268 A. Near Columbretes Islands. Trawling from point 39ss49.65¾N, 0ss37.57¾E to point 39ss52.56¾N, 0ss37.59¾E, 82–86 m depth, 11 July 1994. Fauna IV: MNCN 25.03 /3566. Three pieces of at least two diOEerent colonies, one of them senescent and the others with ovicells and embryos. Sta. 283, 39ss53.09¾N, 0ss36.80¾E, N ear La H oradada Island, Columbretes, 80 m depth. Preserved in ethanol 70 %.

Description

Colony reteporiform, delicate. Complete colony shape unknown. Slender trabeculae 0.5–0.7 mm wide with two to ve (usually three) rows of alternating autozooids. F usiform fenestrulae, approximately 2 mm long and 1 mm wide. Autozooids rectangularly elongate; separated by raised sutures when young, later the limits become indistinct due to secondary thickening. F rontal wall smooth, with four to eight small marginal pores. Primary ori ce D-shaped, as long as wide, with the distal border denticulate, deeply immersed and covered by a well-developed peristome, pointed and with a deep lateral pseudosinus which is closed for most of its length by fusion, except for a proximal drop-shaped pseudospiramen. Two spines present, delicate and persisting in late ontogeny, but fragile and easily broken or lost in preserved material. The peristome of many autozooids bears an acutely triangular hooked avicularium, projecting outwards, oblique to the frontal plane. One small elliptical avicularium is present on the frontal wall of most autozooids and similarly shaped avicularia are present on the abfrontal surface of the colony. They have a slender crossbar. M ost zooids bear one of these small avicularia at the centre of the frontal wall, proximally directed in most instances, although any other direction is possible. A very characteristic avicularian type is present on the abfrontal surface: it is elongate, with a small opesia and a long, slender and spatulate rostrum, hooked at its end, the mandible very similar to a pelican’s beak. One avicularium of this type is placed near the proximal end of each fenestrula (rarely lacking), laterally directed. It is not prominent and may become immersed by secondary calci cation. Ovicell prominent, approximately as wide as long, with an elongate median ssure, without a labellum.

Discussion

Reteporella pelecanus n. sp. is unambiguously characterized by the abfrontal elongate and spatulate avicularia present near the base of each fenestrula, which does not exist in any other Atlanto-mediterranean species. The complete colony form is unknown, but two of the pieces found ( MNCN 25.03/1252 and one of the fragments of 25.03/3566) include the base and part of the growing edge, which is at a distance of 12 mm from the base. They seem to be fragments of broadly open cups.

Some features of the new species may resemble Reteporella grimaldii (Jullien, in Jullien and Calvet, 1903). Reteporella grimaldii is the actual name for the species usually known as R. septentrionalis ( Harmer, 1933) . Reverter-Gil and Fernández Pulpeiro (1999) have pointed out the synonymy of both names and, under the law of priority previous to rst January 2000 ( ICZN, 1999), the senior synonym ( Reteporella grimaldii ) has the priority. Reteporella grimaldii has been recently revised by Hayward and Ryland (1996, 1999) and Reverter-Gil and Fernández-Pulpeiro (1999), and some material from the Straits of G ibraltar and the ‘Fauna’ expeditions has been examined by the authors of this work.

As in R. grimaldii , R. pelecanus has labial triangular avicularia. N evertheless, the labial avicularia of R. grimaldii are often gigantic and project perpendicularly to the frontal plane, while those of R. pelecanus are never longer than the width of an autozooid and are always obliquely directed. G igantic avicularia similar to the labial type occur in the base of the fenestrulae of R.. grimaldii : they are triangular, not spatulate, prominent and partially visible in frontal view. In contrast, the gigantic abfrontal avicularia of R. pelecanus are spatulate, fully abfrontal in position and not prominent, their frontal plane being parallel to the plane of the colony. They are placed near the base of the fenestrulae and they are not visible in frontal view.

Etymology. pelecanus refers to shape of the abfrontal spatulate avicularium, similar to a pelican’s beak.