Home / Rhodophyceae / Macroreds / Ahnfeltia
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Name derivation:
Ahnfeltia: named for Professor Nils Otto Ahnfelt of Lund, Sweden, a bryologist plicata: L. plicatus: foldled up or folded into pleats or furrows Common name:= wire weed
Classification:
Ahnfeltia Fries 1836; 9 of 32 species descriptions are currently accepted taxonomically (Guiry and Guiry 2014). Order Ahnfeltiales; Family Ahnfeltiaceae
Morphology:
A wiry, dichotomously branched red alga producing multiple terete branches from a common base. The alga is sometimes proliferously branched, particularly after being injured. Ahnfeltia is a gametophytic generations that sometimes alternates with a tetrasporangial crustose phase that has been previously designated as “Porphyrodiscus simulans “.
Similar genera:
Similar to Polyides, except that Ahnfeltia’s is more stiff and tends to be narrower.
Habitat:
Grows in the low littoral and shallow sublittoral zones, often in sand abraded habitats. A psammophytic (sand tolerating) species like Polyides.
References:
Chen 1977. The sporophyte of Ahnfeltia plicata (Huds.) Fries (Rhodophyceae, Gigartinales) in culture. Phycologia 16: 163-168 Farnham, W. F. and F. L. Fletcher. 1976. The occurrence of a Porphyrodiscus simulans Batt. phase in the life history of Ahnfeltia plicata (Hudson) Fries. Br. Phycol. J. 11: 183-190 Guiry, M.D., and G.M. Guiry 2013. AlgaeBase. World-wide electronic publication, National University of Ireland, Galway. http://www.algaebase.org; searched on 16 January 2013. Taylor, W. R. 1957. Marine Algae of the Northeastern Coast of North America. Revised edition. Univ. Michigan Press., Ann Arbor, ix + 509 pp.