Preview
Family
Gorgoniidae
Common Name(s)
Deichmann's sea plume
Colony Form
Pinnate, plumose, <1 m tall.
Axis
Cylindrical
Branches
Pinnules short, flattened, flexible, irregularly spaced, to 5.0 cm long, 1-2 mm wide and 3.5-10.0 mm apart (average 6 mm), tapered but with tips slightly bulbous, arising at 40-45º angle toward branch tip, oriented in one plane.
Apertures
Slit-like, chiefly flush and distributed along pinnule edges in single or alternating double series.
Mucus
None
Color
Lavender; dries pale violet, tan or yellow
Sclerites
Polyp armature: numerous flat rods to 0.14 mm long. Body wall: scaphoids (curved sclerites) with pointed or blunt, finely spinose ends, to 0.25 mm long and with a slight medial waist; convex profile smooth or finely spiny. Spindles to 0.24 mm long.
Habitat
Reefs at depths of 2-30 m.
Distribution
Bahamas, South Florida, and Caribbean Sea.
Similar Species
Date Taken
April 2016
Notes
Similar to Antillogorgia bipinnata but with pinnules thicker, more widely spaced, and not regularly distributed. May be preyed on by the flamingo tongue gastropod Cyphoma gibbosum. Williams and Chen (2012) transferred all Western Atlantic species of Pseudopterogorgia to the genus Antillogorgia. Sánchez and Wirshing (2005) treat A. albatrossae Bayer (1961) as a synonym of this species. The species was named for octocoral researcher Elisabeth Deichmann.