Pycnoclavella stanleyi

Figure 9 B – D IHAK 15 BHAK 1008 Calvert Island, headland between Sixth and Seventh Beach. A dominant member of a low intertidal tide pool. RHAK 6 BHAK 0634 UF 2485. Seventh Beach, north wall, low intertidal tide pool. May be the same tidepool as IHAK 15 but sampled on a different day. One colony with completely encrusted and embedded grey sand in many small narrow heads; clumps with Eudistoma ritteri, Aplidium kottae and A. californicum. ZHAK 35 BHAK 3252 UF 2570. Sasquatch Commode tidepool, with Eudistoma ritteri and Metandrocarpa taylori Huntsman, 1912. Bright yellow or orange tiny thoraxes emerge independently from a base in which the elongate abdomens are embedded in a matrix encrusted and impregnated with sand, with a maximum zooid length of less than 2 cm. The zooids, though tightly packed together, are actually independently covered by their own tunic and only share a common tunic at the base, as figured by Trason (1963). Each thorax has seven rows of stigmata, easily visible in the enlargement of part of a colony in Fig. 9 B, photographed underwater in situ by G. Paulay. There may be some yellow or orange pigment on the abdomens (Trason 1963), or pigment may be occasionally lacking and the zooids including thoraxes are colorless and transparent, as pictured in Lamb & Hanby (2005). A complete description is given by Berrill & Abbott (1949) and Trason (1963). Distribution: British Columbia to northern Mexico (Lamb & Hanby 2005).