Dudresnaya hawaiiensis R.K.S.Lee

Scientific Description

Habit and structure. Thallus 4–6 cm tall, light pink, arising from a discoid holdfast, irregularly and profusely branched; individual axes hirsute. Primary axial cells 25–75 µm diam. [L:B c. 4], without a crystalline inclusion, each cell often bearing medially to distally 1 major branch and 2 or 3 carpogonial filaments, also terminally and laterally on cortical filaments.

Reproduction. Carpogonial branches 8–11 cells long, with the terminal 1 or 2 cells recurved. Auxiliary cell branches 13–17 (or more) cells long, continuing growth following diploidisation of the auxiliary cell; auxiliary cell the fifth or sixth cell from the base, with prominently modified cells proximal and distal to it. Mature gonimoblast spherical, 150–180 µm diam., with angular carposporangia 10–12 µm diam. w

Distribution. Widespread in warmer waters of the central and western Pacific Ocean; also in South Africa.

Habitat. Epilithic in the subtidal in north-western Australia, but also reported to be epiphytic or epizoic elsewhere in its range.

[After J.M. Huisman in Algae of Australia: Marine Benthic Algae of North-western Australia, 2. Red Algae: 176–178 (2018)]