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Electronic Flora of South Australia Genus Fact Sheet
Phylum Rhodophyta – Family Rhodomelaceae – Tribe Uncertain
Thallus forming small pustules on the host surface, each with a basal, hemispherical, pseudoparenchymatous cushion bearing erect, polysiphonous branches; attachment by short, often rhizoidal, cells to the host surface; epiphytic (parasitic?) on Lenormandia spectabilis. Structure. Erect branches mostly simple, with 5 (or 6?) pericentral cells, lightly corticated, with short apical trichoblasts.
Reproduction: Gametophytes probably dioecious. Procarps borne on trichoblasts, with a 4-celled carpogonial branch and sterile cells, soon covered by the pericarp. Carposporophyte with a basal fusion cell and branched gonimoblast bearing clavate terminal carposporangia. Cystocarps ovoid, short-stalked; pericarp ostiolate, 4–5 cells thick. Spermatangial organs borne on trichoblasts, with a sterile basal cell, ovoid.
Tetrasporangia (Schmitz) in stichidia in 2 longitudinal rows, from opposite pericentral cells, with 2–3 cover cells.
Type (and only) species: T microcarpus Schmitz in Schmitz & Falkenberg 1897, p. 478.
Taxonomic notes: Tylocolax is still a little-known genus (see below). Kylin (1956, p. 519) places Tylocolax in his Levringiella Group while Hommersand (1963, p. 348) retains it as of uncertain position. It is here kept as a genus of uncertain position.
References:
HOMMERSAND, M.H. (1963). The morphology and classification of some Ceramiaceae and Rhodomelaceae. Univ. Calif. Pubis. Bot. 35(2), 165–366.
KYLIN, H. (1956). Die Gattungen der Rhodophyceen. (Gleerups: Lund.)
SCHMITZ, F. & FALKENBERG, P. (1897). Rhodomelaceae. In Engler, A. & Prantl, K., Die natürlichen Pflanzenfamilien. T.1. Abt. 2, pp. 421–480. (Englemann: Leipzig.)
The Marine Benthic Flora of Southern Australia Part IIID complete list of references.
Publication:
Womersley, H.B.S. (24 February, 2003)
The Marine Benthic Flora of Southern Australia
Rhodophyta. Part IIID. Ceramiales – Delesseriaceae, Sarcomeniaceae, Rhodomelaceae
Reproduced with permission from The Marine Benthic Flora of Southern Australia Part IIID 2003, by H.B.S. Womersley. Australian Biological Resources Study, Canberra. Copyright Commonwealth of Australia.
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