Memoirs of the Queensland Museum – Nature 62

A new carnivorous sponge (Porifera) from the Coral Sea

Citation

Ekins, M., Horowitz, J., Beaman, R.J. & Hooper, J.N.A. 2021. A new carnivorous sponge (Porifera) from the Coral Sea. Memoirs of the Queensland Museum – Nature 62: 205-215. https://doi.org/10.17082/j.2204-1478.62.2021.2020-06

Accepted

12 October 2020

Published online

4 January 2021

Peer reviewed

Yes

DOI

https://doi.org/10.17082/j.2204-1478.62.2021.2020-06

Keywords

Porifera, Cladorhizidae, Queensland, Tasmantid, seamounts, Lycopodina, new species

Abstract 

A new species of carnivorous sponge, Lycopodina coralseaensis sp. nov., family Cladorhizidae, is described from the Louisiade Plateau, Coral Sea, off the east coast of Australia at bathyal depths of ~2000 m, collected during the RV Investigator 2019 voyage. The new species differs from other Lycopodina with stipitate morphology by lacking forceps microscleres, similar to L. nikitawimandi Ekins et al., 2020a but differing in having only a very small single size class of palmate anisochelae, and most importantly by having a third category of mycalostyle echinating the stem and basal holdfast. This new species is the sixth Lycopodina recently described as new from the Australian Exclusive Economic Zone (L. nikitawimandi, L. helios, L. cassida, L. brochidodroma and L. hystrix), bringing the total number of carnivorous sponges known so far from Australia to 26.