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New Zealand Coelenterates Ctenophores from Cook Strait
Discussion
Discussion
It is with hesitation that we revive the genus Lesueuria Milne-Edwards, 1841, to receive these New Zealand specimens of the O. Lobata, for Mortensen (1912) unhesitatingly concluded that Lesueuria is nothing else than a regenerating Bolina (Syn. Bolinopsis Mayer 1912). All the present specimens fall within the generic description of Lesueuria as defined by Mayer (1912). "Lobatae with rudimentary oral lappets and with long, ribbon-shaped auricles. The peripheral gastrovascular system is simple, without complex windings." At present we see no adequate reason
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for concluding that our specimens are regenerating from a damaged condition, so that the characters displayed by the New Zealand specimens, i.e., small oral lappets and long ribbon-shaped auricles properly assign them to the genus Lesueuria and not Bolinopsis. Lesueuria and Bolinopsis have been taken on the same day and can readily be distinguished one from the other. The oral lobes of the present specimens of Lesueuria are about one-quarter the total length of the body, whereas in Bolinopsis, the lobes are usually nearly two-thirds the total body length. The type species is L. vitrea Milne-Edwards 1841, of the Mediterranean. L. hyboptera "the so-called American species is more nearly rectangular in outline than the oval-shaped L. vitrea. In L. hyboptera the body is wider both above and below than it is in the middle, thus giving the appearance of a laterally flattened hour glass." (Mayer 1912.) The body shape of L. pinnata is more like L. hyboptera than L. vitrea but the oral lobes are longer than in either of these species. L. pinnata can further be distinguished from L. vitrea and L. hyboptera by the presence of four, fin-like, marginally papillose, flaps alongside the meridional subventral bands of swimming plates and by what appear to be small transverse canals below each of the comb plates.
Text Fig. IV.
Lesueuria pinnata n. sp. Drawing reconstructed from a photograph. F, fin-like flap beside subventral row of swimming plates; CC, canal-like structures below each comb plate; PL, papillose margin of flap.
for concluding that our specimens are regenerating from a damaged condition, so that the characters displayed by the New Zealand specimens, i.e., small oral lappets and long ribbon-shaped auricles properly assign them to the genus Lesueuria and not Bolinopsis. Lesueuria and Bolinopsis have been taken on the same day and can readily be distinguished one from the other. The oral lobes of the present specimens of Lesueuria are about one-quarter the total length of the body, whereas in Bolinopsis, the lobes are usually nearly two-thirds the total body length. The type species is L. vitrea Milne-Edwards 1841, of the Mediterranean. L. hyboptera "the so-called American species is more nearly rectangular in outline than the oval-shaped L. vitrea. In L. hyboptera the body is wider both above and below than it is in the middle, thus giving the appearance of a laterally flattened hour glass." (Mayer 1912.) The body shape of L. pinnata is more like L. hyboptera than L. vitrea but the oral lobes are longer than in either of these species. L. pinnata can further be distinguished from L. vitrea and L. hyboptera by the presence of four, fin-like, marginally papillose, flaps alongside the meridional subventral bands of swimming plates and by what appear to be small transverse canals below each of the comb plates.