University Herbarium, UC Berkeley: Indian Ocean Catalogue

IOC entry for Ralfsia expansa

Ralfsia expansa (J. Agardh) J. Agardh

Myrionema (?) expansum J. Agardh, 1847: 7 (type locality: Veracruz, Mexico).

Ralfsia expansa (J. Agardh) J. Agardh, 1848b: 63.—Weber-van Bosse, 1913a: 146–147, fig. 45.— Levring, 1938: 19.— Stephenson, 1944: 349.— Stephenson, 1947: 299.— Isaac, 1956a: 176–177, figs. 11, 12.— Isaac, 1957b: 87.— Isaac, 1958: 20.— Pocock, 1958: 25.— Simons, 1969: 251, fig. (s.n.).— Umamaheswara Rao & Sreeramulu, 1970a: 32, figs. 24–26.— Simons, 1977: 29, fig. 67.— Brown & Jarman, 1978: 1254.— S. Dixit, 1980: 67.— Seagrief, 1980: 23, fig. on pl. 4.— M. Balakrishnan & Kinkar, 1981: 34–35, figs. 127–132.— Untawale, Dhargalkar, & Agadi, 1983: [18].— Bolton, 1986: 253.— Lambert & Steinke, 1986a: 54.— Lambert & Steinke, 1986b: 205, 211, 212, 213, 214.— Seagrief, 1988: 42, fig. 5:3.— R. Anderson & Stegenga, 1989: 302.— Farrell, Critchley, & Aken, 1993: 150.— Branch et al., 1994: 340.— Farrell et al., 1994: 280.— Wynne, 1995: 323.

INDIAN OCEAN DISTRIBUTION: India, Indonesia, Mozambique, Seychelles (Mahé Island), South Africa.

Note: A collection from Still Bay, eastern Cape Province, South Africa, was reported by Stephenson, Stephenson, & du Toit (1937: 372) under the manuscript name Lepadoderma africanum Dickinson. According to Stephenson (1944: 349, footnote), this unpublished new genus and species is referable to Ralfsia expansa. Hollenberg (1968d: 74–75) expressed the probability that the records of R. expansa for Indonesia (Weber-van Bosse, l.c.) are representative of Ralfsia pangoensis Setchell (1924: 167, fig. 33.3; type locality: Tutuila Island, American Samoa). The latter species was assigned to Mesospora by Chihara & Tanaka (in J. Tanaka & Chihara, 1982: 387), but in accordance with the opinion of Womersley (1987: 74) that Mesospora should be merged with Hapalospongidion D. Saunders, the combination

Hapalospongidion pangoense

(Setchell) P. Silva is proposed.