Description

Description: The sponge is lamellar, somewhat resembling a rooster’s crest. It is 0.3 cm thick, 7 cm long and 7 cm high. The apical portion of the crest has many small apical digitiform projections 0.6 cm high (more than 50) distributed in rows. The small apical digitiform projections remain in the preserved specimen and show their apical portion darker than the base, which has the same colour of the rest of the sponge (Figs. 15 A – B). In the upper part of the crest the sponge attains 1 cm in thickness. Small oscula appear on the apex and sides, where small projections are observed also bearing fistules on their top. The surface is very coarsely finely conulose. The colour is bluish gray in vivo (Fig. 9 C), which turns into a light shade of brown after preservation in ethanol. Consistency is very soft and flexible. Skeleton: Choanosome with a delicate and irregular network of spongin fibers (Fig. 15 C). Bark with amber colour and 46 – 232 Μm thickness (average 117 Μm). Thick, black or amber pith, 13 – 50 Μm thick (average 32 Μm; Fig. 15 D).

Common Names

Taxonomic Hierarchy

Kingdom: Animalia

Phylum: Porifera

Class: Demospongiae

Order: Verongiida

Family: Aplysinidae

Genus: Aplysina

Species: Aplysina cristagallus Pinheiro, Hajdu & Custódio, 2007