MarLIN

information on the biology of species and the ecology of habitats found around the coasts and seas of the British Isles

A sea anemone (Anemonactis mazeli)

Distribution data supplied by the Ocean Biogeographic Information System (OBIS). To interrogate UK data visit the NBN Atlas.

Researched byEmily Wilson Refereed byAdmin
AuthorityFischer, 1887
Other common names- Synonyms-

Summary

Description

A sea anemone with a variable colouration, column white, orange, red or brown, usually streaked or spotted with white or cream on its upper part. The disc and the tentacles are cream, orange or colourless, often freckled with brown or purple. Other colour varieties probably occur. The column can grow up to 120mm long and has 20 tentacles in two cycles of 10.

Recorded distribution in Britain and Ireland

Occasional historical records from the English Channel, the Irish Sea and off southwest Ireland. Few recent records.

Global distribution

-

Habitat

Burrows in mud, sand or gravel, always offshore, from 20-650 m depth.

Depth range

-

Identifying features

  • Column elongated in extension, short in contraction, divided indistinctly into physa and scapus, physa becoming a small, adherent disc, without a limbus.
  • Minute papillae are scattered over surface of column.
  • Tentacles 20, in two cycles of 10, each consisting of cylindrical shaft and knobbed tip.

Additional information

There is a possibility that the specimen collected in Strangford Lough, northeast Ireland, is a different species to the ones from Plymouth southwards (Howson & Picton, 1999)

Listed by

- none -

Further information sources

Search on:

NBN WoRMS

Bibliography

  1. Bruce, J.R., Colman, J.S. & Jones, N.S., 1963. Marine fauna of the Isle of Man. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press.

  2. Howson, C.M. & Picton, B.E. (ed.), 1997. The species directory of the marine fauna and flora of the British Isles and surrounding seas. Belfast: Ulster Museum. [Ulster Museum publication, no. 276.]

  3. Howson, C.M. & Picton, B.E. ed., 1999. The species directory of the marine fauna and flora of the British Isles and surrounding seas. CD-ROM Edition. Ulster Museum and The Marine Conservation Society, Belfast and Ross-on-Wye., Belfast: Ulster Museum. [Ulster Museum publication no. 280.]

  4. Manuel, R.L., 1988. British Anthozoa. London: Academic Press.[Synopses of the British Fauna, no. 18.]

  5. MBA (Marine Biological Association), 1957. Plymouth Marine Fauna. Plymouth: Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom.

  6. National Biodiversity Network (NBN) Atlas website. Available from: http://www.nbnatlas.org.  Accessed 01 April 2017

Citation

This review can be cited as:

Wilson, E. 2004. Anemonactis mazeli A sea anemone. In Tyler-Walters H. and Hiscock K. (eds) Marine Life Information Network: Biology and Sensitivity Key Information Reviews, [on-line]. Plymouth: Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom. Available from: http://www.marlin.ac.uk/species/detail/1222

Last Updated: 10/08/2004