Preview
Family
Briareidae
Common Name(s)
Climbing knobby sea mat
Colony Form
Encrusting, usually with irregular swellings or meatball-like lobes. Polyps >1 cm, with long tentacles, appearing as dense fur or hair when extended, making colony appear much thicker than when polyps are retracted.
Axis
None
Branches
None
Apertures
Pinhole-sized, each often on a low swelling.
Mucus
Absent, but with slippery surface.
Color
Purple, purplish gray, or with some tan; polyps brown, grayish- or greenish brown.
Sclerites
Large tuberculate spindles or 3-rayed sclerites.
Habitat
Typically encrusting on other octocorals in most shallow reef environments.
Distribution
Bahamas, South Florida, and Caribbean Sea.
Similar Species
Date Taken
4-11-2016
Notes
Briareum asbestinum forms one to several upright, unbranched rods connected by a common basal mat. Erythropodium caribaeorum is beige or tan, with smaller polyps, and encrusts on hard substrates.