- Reference
- Spec.Gen.Ord.Alg. 2:592-593 (1852)
- Conservation Code
- Not threatened
- Naturalised Status
- Native to Western Australia
- Name Status
- Current
Scientific Description
Habit and structure. Thallus erect to partially decumbent, to 12 cm tall, red to purple (often with a patchy iridescence underwater), cartilaginous, subdichotomously branched; branches terete or slightly compressed, (2.0–) 3.5–4.5 (–5.0) mm diam., with blunt apices; structure apparently uniaxial, but central axis obscure, pseudoparenchymatous, with large medullary cells grading abruptly into a smaller-celled cortex.
Reproduction. Tetrasporangia scattered in the outer cortex, cruciately divided, 40–50 × 20–25 μm. Spermatangia in deep pits (“verrucosa-type”); conceptacles 40–50 μm wide. Cystocarps to 2 mm diam., deeply embedded in the thallus, surrounded by a well-defined ring of hyaline tissue.
Distribution. This Indo-Pacific alga is known from the Houtman Abrolhos Islands, Western Australia around northern Australia and possibly to Townsville, Queensland.
Habitat. Epilithic in the intertidal and subtidal.
[After J.M. Huisman in Algae of Australia: Marine Benthic Algae of North-western Australia, 2. Red Algae: 350–351 (2018)]
Distribution
- IBRA Regions
- Carnarvon.
- IBRA Subregions
- Cape Range.
- Local Government Areas (LGAs)
- Ashburton.