Bougainvilliidae Lütken, 1850

Calder, Dale R., 2010, Some anthoathecate hydroids and limnopolyps (Cnidaria, Hydrozoa) from the Hawaiian archipelago 2590, Zootaxa 2590 (1), pp. 1-91 : 19

Family Bougainvilliidae Lütken, 1850

Bougainvilleae Lütken, 1850:29 [emended to Bougainvilliidae by Allman (1876)].

Diagnosis. Filiferan hydroids colonial, stolonal or erect; arising from a creeping hydrorhiza; growth monopodial with terminal hydranths. Perisarc thin to thick, enveloping hydrocauli, hydrocladia, pedicels, and hydrorhiza, terminating at bases of hydranths or extending upwards as a pseudohydrotheca. Hydranths clubshaped to vasiform; tentacles filiform, in one or more distal whorls; hypostome conical to nipple-shaped.

Gonophores fixed sporosacs or free medusae. Medusae, when present, bell-shaped, with typically short manubrium and circular mouth; oral tentacles simple or dichotomously branched, rarely lacking; radial canals four; marginal tentacles solitary or in clusters, borne on 4, 8, or 16 tentacle bulbs; gonads on manubrium.

Remarks. For comments on the family Bougainvilliidae Lütken, 1850 , see Calder (1988) and Schuchert (2007). It presently comprises 15 genera and about 100 species ( Schuchert 2009).