Hemimycale columella is an encrusting sponge of 10 to 30 cm in diameter and up to more than 1 cm thick. It has an irregular form varying in colour from pink to pale orange. The surface is covered with irregularly circular craters, containing the inhaling openings. The crater edges are underlined by a clear margin. It lives attached to rocks sometimes in close contact with algae or benthic animals.
Phorbas fictitius also has a surface covered with circular craters but their edges are not underlined by a paler margin and they are more regularly placed.The colour of P. fictitius is red, pink or yellowish-grey.
Hemimycale columella is recorded in the Atlantic Ocean, the English Channel and the Mediterranean Sea.
Source : World Register of Marine Species
Dernière mise à jour 24-11-2022
Animalia (Kingdom)
Porifera (Phylum)
Demospongiae (Class)
Heteroscleromorpha (Subclass)
Poecilosclerida (Order)
Hymedesmiidae (Family)
Hemimycale (Genus)
Hemimycale columella (Species)
Inhaling pore : = Ostioles. Holes through which water enters the sponge.
Benthic animals : Animals living on the bottom, attached or not, opposed to pelagic animals that is to say free-swimming animals.
Text : Wilfried Bay-Nouailhat © 2004 - 2024.
Photos : ©
Wilfried Bay-Nouailhat. Published with his kind permission.
Websites and reference works : Consult bibliography
Image satellite: © Esri, DigitalGlobe, GeoEye, Earthstar Geographics, CNES/Airbus DS, USDA, USGS, AeroGRID, IGN, and the GIS User Community.
Données de distribution : Hemimycale columella (Bowerbank, 1874) in GBIF Secretariat (2019). GBIF Backbone Taxonomy. Checklist dataset https://doi.org/10.15468/39omei accessed via GBIF.org on 2024-11-12.
Source : World Register of Marine Species
Dernière mise à jour 24-11-2022
Animalia (Kingdom)
Porifera (Phylum)
Demospongiae (Class)
Heteroscleromorpha (Subclass)
Poecilosclerida (Order)
Hymedesmiidae (Family)
Hemimycale (Genus)
Hemimycale columella (Species)
Inhaling pore : = Ostioles. Holes through which water enters the sponge.
Benthic animals : Animals living on the bottom, attached or not, opposed to pelagic animals that is to say free-swimming animals.
Text : Wilfried Bay-Nouailhat © 2004 - 2024.
Photos : ©
Wilfried Bay-Nouailhat. Published with his kind permission.
Websites and reference works : Consult bibliography
Bay-Nouailhat W., april 2004, Description of Hemimycale columella, [On line] https://european-marine-life.org/02/hemimycale-columella.php, consulted on 2024 November 12.
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