Codium

Codium
Dead man's fingers (Codium fragile) off the Massachusetts coast
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Plantae
Division: Chlorophyta
Class: Bryopsidophyceae
Order: Bryopsidales
Family: Codiaceae
Genus: Codium
Stackhouse, 1797
Type species
Codium tomentosum
Stackhouse, 1797
Species

See text

Codium cylindricum Holmes, type definition herbarium specimen.

Codium is a genus of seaweed in the Chlorophyta of the Order Bryopsidales. There are about 50 species worldwide. [1]

Description

The genus has thalli of two forms, either erect or prostrate. The erect plants are dichotomously branched to 40 cm long with branches forming a compact spongy structure, not calcareous. The final branches form a surface layer of close palisade cortex of utricles. The non-erect species form either a prostrate or globular thallus with a velvet-like surface, the final branches forming a close cortex of utricles. [2]

Distribution

Ireland

Two of these species are very rare in Ireland. Codium adhaerens has been recorded from a few sites on the west coast and from Tory Island on the north coast in County Donegal. In 1837 it was found in Church Bay in County Antrim,[3] but has not been found there since.

There are other species of "doubtful validity":- Codium amphibium is included in Harvey's Phycologia Britannica Pl.xxxv. and noted as: "spreading in patches of great extent along the edge of the sea, over the surface of a turf-bog which meets the shore at Roundstone Bay" (Ireland).

Worldwide

References

  1. ↑ C. van den Hoek; D. G. Mann; M. H. Jahns (1995). Algae: An Introduction to Phycology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-30419-9.
  2. ↑ E. M. Burrows (1991). Seaweeds of the British Isles. Volume 2. Chlorophyta. London: Natural History Museum. ISBN 0-565-00981-8.
  3. ↑ Morton,O. 1994. Marine Algae of Northern Ireland. Ulster Museum. ISBN 0 900761 28 8
  4. ↑ Abbott, Isabella A (1989). Lembi, Carole A.; Waaland, J. Robert, eds. Algae and human affairs. Cambridge University Press, Phycological Society of America. p. 141. ISBN 978-0-521-32115-0. Food and food products from seaweeds

General references

External links

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