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Benthic Marine Algae of Rotuma Island
(Figs 176, 178, 180, 184)
Plants delicate, creeping, up to 10 mm long and with regular patterns of constrictions
(nodes and internodes) which are potential points of attachment of thallus to the substratum
via multicellular holdfasts composed of numerous rhizoids terminating in subpeltate knobs.
Blades up to 0.6 mm wide, with branching endogenous from the thallus midrib. A
transversely dividing cell terminates each axis or blade, with all 3rd-order initials reaching
the thallus margin, and all cells of the 2nd-order cell row bear 3rd-order rows. Blade edges
monostromatic, with radial line composed of an axial cell plus 4 pericentral cells. Plants
sterile.
Distribution
Lord Howe Island, Samoa, southern Marshall Islands, Solomon Islands, Australia.
Fijian Record
N'Yeurt et al. 1996b.
Rotuman Distribution
Tua'koi (*TI71 USP S4: 13).
Habitat and Remarks
Found creeping on Acropora coral rubble on outer reef. There appears to exist much
confusion in the literature between the genera Caloglossa and Hypoglossum, and this calls
for a re-examination of other records of Caloglossa from deep-water habitats in the South
Pacific (see Wynne and Kraft 1985).
Martensia Hering 184 1 : 92
Martensia elegans Hering 1841: 92 (type locality unknown); Harvey 1847: 73, pl. 43;
Weber-van Bosse 1923: 386; Kylin 1956: 449; Jaasund 1976: 1 19, fig. 242; Tsuda and Wray
1977: 109; Lewis 1984: 46; Garrigue and Tsuda 1988: 66; Millar 1990: 417, fig. 53A, B;
Millar and Kraft 1993: 47.
Hemitrema elegans R. Brown 1843.
Mesotrema elegans J. Agardh 1854: 110.
(Fig. 131)
Plants with soft pinkish-red lobes; 15-30 mm high. Periodic intercalary growth producing
grid-like network, the grids being the edges of bands extended at right angles to the plane of
the blades, and interconnected by anastomosing filaments from the grid walls. Plants sterile.
Distribution
Fiji, New Caledonia, Micronesia, Australia, Indonesia, Tanzania.
Fijian Records
South 1991: 9; in Herb. Institute of Marine Resources, University of the South Pacific
(USP 3 13).
Rotuman Distribution
Hapmafau (HAP241 USP 350).
Habitat and Remarks
Tidal pool, middle reef.