- Reference
- Hedwigia 49 (1899)
- Conservation Code
- Not threatened
- Naturalised Status
- Native to Western Australia
- Name Status
- Current
Scientific Description
Habit and structure. Thallus dark red-brown, erect, 10–30 cm high, with a single axis bearing long lateral branches 2–3(–4) mm in diameter, heavily corticated and denuded over lower half or more (probably perennial with annual re-growth). Branches bearing relatively slender laterals 2–5 cm long, with distichous pseudolaterals. Holdfast discoid, 2–10 cm across; epilithic. Structure. Apices of axes sympodial and distichous, developing (12–)13 pericentral cells commencing shortly below the apical cell. Pseudolaterals 4–5 segments apart, 2–3 mm long, each with subdichotomous, more or less distichous, coarse branches (2–)3–4 segments apart, becoming polysiphonous (5–8 pericentral cells) but with monosiphonous terminal branches, cells tapering abruptly to an acute end cell, some pseudolaterals developing markedly slender terminal tufts; monosiphonous branches 90–120 µm in diameter, cells L/D 0.7–1.2, but the slender filaments basally 35–45 µm in diameter, cells L/D 1.5–2, tapering gradually to upper cells 10–12 µm in diameter and L/D 4–7. Cortication commencing on polysiphonous lower segments of pseudolaterals from small cells cut off pericentral cells, developing rapidly and on axes and lateral branches forming a pseudoparenchymatous cortex 0.7–1.5 mm and many cells thick, with smaller cells between the prominent axial cell and the ring of pericentral cells; outer cortex without anticlinal filaments. Rhodoplasts discoid to elongate or in chains in axial cells.
Reproduction. Gametophytes dioecious. Procarps unknown. Cystocarps large and prominent, ovoid, 1.5–2 mm in diameter, with a slight neck, sessile on polysiphonous branches; pericarp dense, with an outer layer of irregular cells; carposporophytes much branched, with a basal fusion cell and rows of ovoid carposporangia, 20–45 µm in diameter. Spermatangial branches developed as terminal branches of the slender monosiphonous tufts, 90–120 µm long and 30–40 µm in diameter. Tetrasporangial stichidia situated on lower polysiphonous branches of coarse pseudolaterals, lanceoid to cylindrical, 400–1400 µm long and 200–280 µm in diameter, with 6 sporangia per whorl, each with 2 pre-sporangial cover cells divided horizontally, largely covering the sporangia; tetrasporangia 60–90 µm in diameter.
Distribution. Eyre, W. Aust., to Nora Creina, S. Aust.
Habitat. H. curdieana is probably a deep water species.
[After Parsons & Womersley in Womersley, Mar. Benthic Fl. Southern Australia IIIC: 494–496 (1998)]