Leucandrilla intermedia
Creators: name: Van, Rob W. M.
name: De, Nicole J.
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2018
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Porifera
Calcarea
Leucosolenida
Grantiidae
Leucandrilla
Leucandrilla intermedia

description: Leucandrilla aff. intermedia (Row, 1909)
Figs 62a–c, 63a–h
? Leucilla intermedia Row, 1909: 205, pl. 20 fig.7, textfig. 5.
Leucandra infesta Dendy & Row, 1913: 771.
Material examined. ZMA Por. 13482, Israel, Gulf of Aqaba, Schuhmacher’s Pinnacle, depth 2 m, under dead Acropora, coll. M. Wunsch, field nr. AQ 126, 10 July 1998.
Description. Spiny-hairy, light green tube (Fig. 62a) attached partially sideways to the substratum. Size 1.5 cm in length and approximately 1 cm in diameter. Terminal oscule naked, 3 mm in diameter. In alcohol (Fig. 62b) the specimen is dirty white. Consistency firm.
Aquiferous system. Syllebeid.
Skeleton. (Fig. 62c) In cross section, the skeleton of the wall shows a cortical layer of small triactines pierced by giant diactines, subcortical skeleton of sagittal large tetractines, choanosomal and subatrial giant, intermediate and small triactines and tetractines, and atrial sagittal triactines and tetractines. The oscular collar contains trichoxeas.
Spicules. (Figs 63a–h) Diactines, triactines, tetractines, trichoxeas,
Giant diactines (Figs 63a,a 1) fusiform, tapering to thin points, more or less equiended, 1000– 2313 –4680 x 24 – 44.3 –50 µm
Cortical triactines (Fig. 63b), slightly sagittal, but equiactinal, 81– 114 –141 x 7.5– 9.3 –11 µm
Subcortical large tetractines (Fig. 63c) with apical actines longest and protruding into the choanosome, with unpaired actines 225– 276 –405 x 18 –28.1–44 µm, paired actines 152– 238 –324 x 15 –21.6–30 µm, and apical actines 37– 184 –390 x 9 – 21.0 –42 µm.
Large triactines (Fig. 63d) and intermediate forms from the choanosomal and subatrial region, slightly sagittal, 165– 364 –570 x 15 – 30.9 –51 µm.
Large tetractines (Fig. 63e) from the choanosomal and subatrial region, slightly sagittal, unpaired actines 129– 227 –345 x 15 – 22.5 –34 µm, paired actines 153– 249 –324 x 12 – 17.8 –24 µm, apical actines 37– 53 – 62 x 8 – 14.3 –19 µm
Atrial triactines (Fig. 63f), sagittal, unpaired actines 63– 137 –181 x 7 – 8.8 –11 µm, paired actines 141– 161 –174 x 6 – 8.6 –12 µm.
Atrial tetractines (Fig. 63g), sagittal, with thin sharp apical actines, unpaired actines 96– 119 –148 x 10 –12.0–16 µm, paired actines 123– 154 –186 x 10 – 10.8 –14 µm, apical actines 15– 26.3 – 37 x 6 – 8.3 –12 µm.
Trichoxeas (Fig. 63h), invariably broken, 800– 1000 x 3 –3.5 µm.
Distribution and ecology. Red Sea, shallow depth.
Remarks. The above-described specimen conforms in most details to Row’s description and figures of specimens from Suez. There are slight discrepancies in the spicule sizes, but these are rather generalized in Row’s treatment, so this is of not much concern. In contrast to Row’s description there are triactines among the atrial spicules in our specimen, which throws some doubt on our identification, hence our assignment to aff. intermedia. It cannot be excluded that our material belongs to a different closely similar species.
Dendy & Row’s (1913) new name Leucandra infesta for the secondary homonymy of Row’s Leucilla intermedia with Haeckel’s (1872) Leucetta paradoxa var. intermedia has become moot, because the two species involved are now reassigned to different genera. Since the replacement name L. infesta was only used once in Burton’s (1963) summary of Row’s description, which does not count as ‘use’ in the sense of ICZN art. 59.3, the name L. intermedia is reinstated.
Unfortunately, we were unable to obtain partial 28S sequence data. To investigate the likely position of the genus Leucandrilla in our phylogeny of Fig. 3, we obtained sequences of a Leucandrilla spec. (GenBank acc.nrs. MF872768, MF872769, MF872770 and MF872771) from the Galapagos Islands. We included these in a separate analysis of the combined Galapagos and all other Calcaronea sequences, with the result that the Galapagos Leucandrilla grouped in the same clade with the above mentioned Leucandra sequences, at a low bootstrap value (42%). We do not show this result because we did not obtain Western Indian Ocean or Red Sea sequences of Leucandrilla to compare them with, but mention this examination to confirm that Leucandrilla and Leucandra are likely more closely related to each other than either is to other Calcaronea.
description: Published as part of Van, Rob W. M. & De, Nicole J., 2018, Calcareous sponges of the Western Indian Ocean and Red Sea, pp. 1-160 in Zootaxa 4426 (1) on pages 103-105, DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.4426.1.1, http://zenodo.org/record/1271239