. The naturalist in Australia. Natural history. 222 THE NATURALIST IN AUSTRALIA. these thickly clustered tentacles that the commensal fish nestled for shelter, as within the more voluminous tentacular folds of the isolated Discosomse. This socially consorting sea anemone was found on closer examination to correspond very nearly with a new species observed in Torres Straits, and figured and described by the writer in his " Great Barrier" volume under the title of Physobrachia Doiiglasi. The most marked peculiarity of this type was the contour of the tentacles, which in their condition
. The naturalist in Australia. Natural history. 222 THE NATURALIST IN AUSTRALIA. these thickly clustered tentacles that the commensal fish nestled for shelter, as within the more voluminous tentacular folds of the isolated Discosomse. This socially consorting sea anemone was found on closer examination to correspond very nearly with a new species observed in Torres Straits, and figured and described by the writer in his " Great Barrier" volume under the title of Physobrachia Doiiglasi. The most marked peculiarity of this type was the contour of the tentacles, which in their condition of full extension were inflated in a bladder- like manner at their distal extremities. The shafts of the tentacles of the Western Australian examples were usually either a transparent dark myrtle green or a clear brown, and the inflated ex- tremities pure white or palest lilac with a minute crimson apical tip. A fairly success- ful photograph of a small area of a reef crevice thickly populated with this particular anemone, necessarily taken vertically through the surface of the water, is reproduced in the accompanying illustration. This anemone group represents one of many that were observed on the reefs at Gantheaume Point, Roebuck Bay, but with which no fish commensals, as at the Lacepede Islands, were found consorted. A characteristic Sea Plate XXXIX. Unlike the Anemone that was obtained -. preceding forms, it is not a by the writer in Beagle Bay, i^^^KHn^L, vook or reef dwelling species. Western Australia, midway -^^BSb^^^H^B^ ^^^^ takes up its abode on between King's Sound and II^HhHHHSP ^^^® sandy foreshores, having a Roebuck Bay, is illustrated ^lliiPB^^I^^^ low^ cylindrical column, which by the photographs repro- extends five or six inches duced in the upper moiety of Cui„hihict,s sp. through the sand to a stone. KLADDER-TEXTACLKIJ ANEMUXES, ]*hl/l^ohrachla sp. W. SamUe-Kent, Fhoto. OXE-TIIIHI) NATURAL Please note that these images are extracted from scanned
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