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REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 83
Common on algæ and on sand-covered rocks at low water along the whole coast.
Not to be mistaken for any other alga on our coast. The gelatinous balls which this species forms are
found growing in large quantities at low-water mark, and are sometimes called potatoes by the
unromantic dwellers on the shore.
FAMILY CHORDARIEÆ.
Fronds cylindrical, branching, usually gelatinous, with an axis of longitudinal
filaments formed of long slender cells, and a cortex composed of short, densely
packed horizontal filaments formed of subspherical cells; sporangia borne among the
cortical filaments or formed directly from them.
Fronds tough and elastic, cortical filaments densely united to one another Chordaria.
Fronds gelatinous, cortical filaments only adhering loosely to one another.
Upper cells of the cortical filaments producing the plurilocular sporangia
............................................................................Castagnea.
Upper cells of cortical filaments not producing sporangia.
Mesogloia.
CHORDARIA, Ag.
(From chorda, a chord.)
Fronds olive-brown, cartilaginous, filiform, branching; axial layer composed of
longitudinally elongated cylindrical cells and smaller winding cells packed closely
together in a solid mass; peripheral layer composed of short, simple, horizontal
filaments, densely packed together; unilocular sporangia oblong, borne at the base of
the peripheral filaments (paraphyses), plurilocular sporangia unknown.
The distinction between the genera Chordaria and Mesogloia, in the absence of a knowledge of the
development of the fronds, must be quite arbitrary. In the present instance we have considered that the
genus Chordaria should be limited to the forms having a tough cartilaginous substance and solid axis,
of which we have only one representative, C. flagelliformis. C. divaricata, both in its consistency and
the development of the frond, seems to belong to Mesogloia, accepting that genus in an extended sense
as we have done.
C. FLAGELLIFORMIS, Ag.; Phyc. Brit., Pl. 3. Pl. V, Fig. 2.
Fronds blackish, solitary or gregarious, attached by a disk, coriaceous, lubricous, one
to two feet long, filiform, solid, main axis usually undivided, furnished with
numerous long, subequal, flagelliform branches, which are given off at wide angles,
simple or with few, irregular, secondary branches; peripheral filaments
(paraphyses) few-celled, cylindrical or slightly club-shaped ; unilocular sporangia
ovoid or pyriform.