Ophiacantha simulans Koehler, 1895c

Madeira, Patrícia, Kroh, Andreas, Cordeiro, Ricardo, De, António M., Martins, Frias & Ávila, Sérgio P., 2019, The Echinoderm Fauna of the Azores (NE Atlantic Ocean), Zootaxa 4639 (1), pp. 1-231 : 36

Ophiacantha simulans Koehler, 1895c

Reports for the Azores:

non Ophiacantha composita Koehler, 1897 a— $ Koehler 1909: 185 [misidentification]; García-Diez et al. 2005: 49 [based on Koehler 1909];

Ophiacantha simulans Koehler, 1895 c—Gage et al. 1983: 291; Paterson 1985: 39–40, fig. 17; Martynov & Litvinova 2008: 96, fig. 11B; Smirnov et al. 2014: 196.

Type locality: Bay of Biscay .

See: Koehler (1895c: 465–467; fig. 7; 1896c: 82–84); Mortensen (1933a: 26–29, figs. 11, 12, pl. 3, figs. 5–6); Paterson (1985).

Occurrence: North Atlantic, from off North Carolina eastwards to Iceland in the North ( Gage et al. 1983), southwards to off Morocco ( Bartsch 1987) including the archipelagos of the Azores and Canaries ( Koehler 1909).

Depth: 1,480–3,018 m ( Mortensen 1933a); AZO : 1,919–3,018 m ( Koehler 1909).

Habitat: soft substrates, mud to muddy sand and corals ( Koehler 1909).

Remarks: Koehler (1906b, 1909) reported small animals collected by the Talisman, Travailleur and Princesse Alice in the Bay of Biscay, Canaries and the Azores, which he believed to be Ophiacantha composita , a species he described for the Indian Ocean. Mortensen (1933a) disagreed with Koehler stating that the NE Atlantic animals were O. simulans . Paterson (1985) re-examined the material from the Talisman and Travailleur collected in the Bay of Biscay and agreed with Mortensen, assigning Koehler’s Ophiacantha composita specimens from the Atlantic to O. simulans .