Aplidium litum

Aplidium litum Monniot & Monniot, 2006

(Figure 6A)

Aplidium litum Monniot F & Monniot C., 2006: 119, figs4; 24C,D, Madagascar, Nosy-Be;

Station. TA 35 (MNHN A1 APL.B 555)

Both colonies are incomplete. They are totally embedded with sand, several cm large. The surface is raised in round low lobes (Fig. 6A). The disposition of the zooid apertures along channels is not obvious; a common cloacal opening is at the top of each colony lobe but other openings may also exist elsewhere at the colony surface. The zooids are very short and thin, no more than 4mm long, colourless in formalin. The oral opening has 6 lobes. The atrial languet is small at the rim of the siphon. There are 9 to 12 stigmata rows and 8 stigmata in a half row. The stomach has 5 round folds. The post-abdomen is short with an anterior ovary and a short line of testis vesicles. One larva is in the atrial cavity; the trunk measures 550µm. The 3 adhesive papillae lie between a crescent of thin ampullae on each side as in Monniot & Monniot (2006 fig. 4).

The specimens from the south of Madagascar have l2 rows of stigmata instead of 13 in specimens from Nosy- Be but a little more stigmata in a row; these characters are estimated variable. A. litum is recollected for the first time from Madagascar and is known nowhere else.