- Blue markers: specimen records
- Yellow marker: type locality, if present
- Red markers: endpoints of range from literature
Gracilaria Greville 1830
Thalli saxicolous, with several to numerous erect branches arising from mostly discoid base. Erect branches cylindrical to complanate, fleshy to cartilaginous. Gonimoblast with or without special filaments connecting with pericarp (Papenfuss, 1967, has found filaments present or lacking in the type species of Gracilaria).
Gracilaria robusta Setch.
Setchell, P.B.-A. 1895-1919 1899: no. 635; Smith 1944: 267. Gracilariopsis robusta (Setch.) Dawson 1949a: 42. Gracilariopsis claviformis Daws. 1961a: 340. Gracilaria claviformis (Daws.) Papenfuss 1967: 100.
Thalli deep red, to 15 cm tall, several erect branches arising from discoid holdfasts; stipes weak, 1-3 mm long, 1 mm thick; erect branches usually 4-5 times dichotomously branched, usually in 1 plane, occasionally with less branching, each dichotomous order shorter and broader than the preceding; lower branches compressed, upper branches terete to compressed, stiff and turgid; tetrasporangia grouped in a somewhat nemathecioid cortex of anticlinal cell rows; spermatangial pockets deep, ovoid, closely spaced, with small ostioles; cystocarps 2-4 mm diam., bulging prominently, nonrostrate, without special filaments between gonimoblast and pericarp.
Locally frequent, saxicolous, low intertidal to subtidal (9 m), Monterey Peninsula; common subtidally off Santa Cruz I., Calif. Type locality: Monterey, Calif.
Numerous specimens dredged off Santa Cruz I., referred to this species, differ in having mostly unbranched erect branches.
Excerpt from Abbott, I. A., & Hollenberg, G. J. (1976). Marine algae of California. Stanford University Press, Stanford, California. xii [xiii] + 827 pp., 701 figs.
