Haliclona (Soestella) De Weerdt, 2000

Kelly, Michelle & Rowden, Ashley A., 2019, New sponge species from hydrothermal vent and cold seep sites off New Zealand, Zootaxa 4576 (3), pp. 401-438 : 404

Subgenus Haliclona (Soestella) De Weerdt, 2000

Haliclona (Soestella) de Weerdt, 2000: 7 .

Diagnosis. Growth form irregularly massive, thickly encrusting, lobate/cushion-shaped, or digitate. Oscula at the end of oscular chimneys or mounds, alongside the branches of digitate forms, flush with the surface of encrusting forms. Consistency varying from soft to moderately firm. Surface even or somewhat irregular, slightly or rather strongly punctate. Colour varying from light to dark brown, black, green to dark red. Ectosomal skeleton a discontinuous tangential, rather open reticulation, due to many rounded meshes framed by spicule lines of 2–5 spicules thick. Choanosomal skeleton a subanisotropic reticulation consisting of ill-defined pausispicular primary lines, irregularly connected by pausispicular secondary lines. Spongin always present at the nodes of the spicules but never abundant. Oxeas usually slender. Microscleres, if present, sigmas, toxas or raphides (de Weerdt 2000, 2002).