Genus Drifa Danielssen, 1887

Museums

Regional Maps

• Drifa Danielssen, D.C. 1887. Alcyonida. The Norwegian North-Atlantic Expedition 1876-1878. Zoology. Chhristiana viii+169, 23pls. [59].

  Type species:

   Drifa hyalina Danielssen, 1887 by subsequent designation, see Verrill, A.E. 1922. Alcyonaria and Actinaria. Report of the Canadian Arctic Expedition 8: 1-164 [30].

Introduction

All the included Australian species are from temperate waters and all but Drifa fusca were erected by Verseveldt (1977: 185-202) and placed in the genus Capnella. However, Capnella is a tropical-subtropical genus with a number of different characteristics. Despite the disjunctive distribution, there is a very close resemblance between the boreal genus Drifa and the Australian group of species, and it is far more useful to place them in this genus for now. Specimens of Drifa glomerata, the type species of the genus, have a gross morphology identical to that of Capnella gaboensis. The sclerites are also extremely similar. The major difference is that Capnella gaboensis has some sclerites in the interior of the base of the stem, which are absent in Drifa glomerata, and the former is zooxanthellate while the latter is azooxanthellate.

It should be noted that not all of the species in the Australian group are zooxanthellate, and it is therefore probably that they represent more than one genus.

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History of changes