Trematooecia Osburn, 1940

Almeida, Ana C. S., Souza, Facelucia B. C., Menegola, Carla M. S., Sanner, Joann & Vieira, Leandro M., 2014, Taxonomic review of the family Colatooeciidae Winston, 2005 (Bryozoa, Cheilostomata), with description of seven new species, Zootaxa 3868 (1), pp. 1-61 : 35

Genus Trematooecia Osburn, 1940

Type species. Trematooecia aviculifera ( Canu & Bassler, 1923) , now fixed under ICZN Article 70.3, misidentified as Trematooecia turrita ( Smitt, 1873) in the original designation by Osburn (1940).

Diagnosis (revised). Colony encrusting, uni- to multilaminar or erect and bilaminar. Autozooids heavily calcified. Frontal wall with frontal pseudopores and marginal areolar pores. Primary orifice transversely D-shaped or hoof-shaped. Secondary orifice formed by raised, rounded tubercles often obscuring the primary orifice. Suboral avicularium often present, seated within peristome near primary orifice. Interzooidal and adventitious avicularia with complete crossbar. Ovicell acleithral, with coarse surface calcification, ectooecium with a single membranous frontal area.

Remarks. Trematooecia was erected by Osburn (1940) to accommodate L. turrita Smitt, 1873 , designated type species, and Trematooecia protecta Osburn, 1940 . Re-examination of the specimens studied by Osburn (1940) from Puerto Rico (Guanica Harbor, 9–32 m), Tortugas Island (20–27 m) and Curaçao (all USNM Acc. No. 208837), allow us to reassign these colonies as T. aviculifera , as suggested by Banta & Carson (1977) and Winston (2005). The main difference between T. aviculifera and C. turrita is the ectooecium, with a circular uncalcified area in T. aviculifera and a longitudinal band of irregular pseudopores in C. turrita . Other differences pertain to the condyles (absent in T. aviculifera , present in C. turrita ) and frontal avicularia (absent in T. aviculifera , dimorphic in C. turrita ), but these characters seem to be variable within both Trematooecia and Cigclisula .

Owing to the misidentification of T. aviculifera as C. turrita , some other species were subsequently incorrectly attributed to Trematooecia , hence the genus has included species with two different types of ectooecium: (i) with an uncalcified central area, characteristic of Trematooecia , and (ii) with a median band of pseudopores, typical of Cigclisula . Thus, some species previously assigned to Cigclisula are here reassigned to Trematooecia , viz. Trematooecia arborescens (Canu & Bassler, 1928) n. comb., Trematooecia gemmea ( Winston & Woollacott, 2009) n. comb., Trematooecia hexagonalis (Canu & Bassler, 1930) and Trematooecia verticalis ( Maplestone, 1910) n. comb.