Corydendrium Van Beneden, 1844a

Calder, Dale R., 2010, Some anthoathecate hydroids and limnopolyps (Cnidaria, Hydrozoa) from the Hawaiian archipelago 2590, Zootaxa 2590 (1), pp. 1-91 : 9-10

Genus Corydendrium Van Beneden, 1844a

Corydendrium Van Beneden, 1844a: 313 .

Type species. Sertularia parasitica Linnaeus, 1767 [ Corydendrium parasiticum ], by monotypy.

Diagnosis. Oceaniid hydroids sometimes stolonal but usually with erect and irregularly branched colonies. Hydrocaulus polysiphonic or less frequently monosiphonic; hydrocladia, if present, adnate for part or all of their length to hydrocaulus or to other hydrocladia. Perisarc firm, covering hydrocauli and hydrocladia, terminating near hydranth bases; perisarcal tubes of side branches nested. Hydranths club-shaped to elongate-tubular, lacking perisarc; tentacles filiform, scattered over most of hydranth.

Gonophores fixed sporosacs, arising below hydranths as elongate, blind sacs of coenosarc, protected within perisarcal tubes of hydrocladia and hydrocaulus.

Remarks. Taxonomic and nomenclatural accounts of Corydendrium Van Beneden, 1844a have been provided by Calder (1988) and Schuchert (2004). Seven species were listed under the genus in the database of Schuchert (2009), with one of those, Corydendrium corrugatum Nutting, 1905 from Hawaii, being considered a nomen dubium. It is included as valid here, but further taxonomic appraisal of the species is warranted.