TY - JOUR
T1 - Reproduction of Dendronephthya hemprichi (Cnidaria: Octocorallia)
T2 - Year-round spawning in an azooxanthellate soft coral
AU - Dahan, M.
AU - Benayahu, Y.
N1 - Funding Information:
Acknowledgements We express our thanks to O. Mokadi, N. Sar, Y. Barki, R. Goren and M. Klainman for their help and friendship. We are grateful to K. Sebens, B. Lazar and anonymous reviewers for many useful comments which greatly improved the manuscript. Y. B. is indebted to K. Sebens for his kind hospitality at the University of Maryland during a sabbatical year. We acknowledge N. Paz and C. Shapiro for editorial assistance. Thanks are due to the staff of the Interuniversity Institute of Marine Biology at Eilat for their kind hospitality and assistance. This paper forms part of an M. Sc. dissertation submitted by M. D. to Tel Aviv University. The research was supported in part by a grant to Y. B. from the Israel Science Foundation, and a grant from the Interuniversity Ecology Foundation.
PY - 1997/10
Y1 - 1997/10
N2 - Sexual reproduction in the azooxanthellate octocoral Dendronephthya hemprichi Klunzinger, 1877 was studied in Eilat (Red Sea) for 2 years beginning March 1989. D. hemprichi is a gonochoric broadcasting species. Gonads at all developmental stages were found throughout the year. Small-sized oocytes and sperm sacs, 51 to 100 μm in diameter, are highly abundant, accompanied by numerous smaller primordial gonads. These features result from continuous gametogenesis, and lead to year-round oocyte and sperm maturation and release. Gamete release was observed in the laboratory on all monitoring dates, and most of the female colonies spawned repeatedly for several successive nights. The reproductive features of D. hemprichi constitute an exception to the generalization that free-spawning reef-corals have brief and synchronized broadcast-spawning episodes. This species demonstrates early onset of first reproduction, which further increases its reproductive output.
AB - Sexual reproduction in the azooxanthellate octocoral Dendronephthya hemprichi Klunzinger, 1877 was studied in Eilat (Red Sea) for 2 years beginning March 1989. D. hemprichi is a gonochoric broadcasting species. Gonads at all developmental stages were found throughout the year. Small-sized oocytes and sperm sacs, 51 to 100 μm in diameter, are highly abundant, accompanied by numerous smaller primordial gonads. These features result from continuous gametogenesis, and lead to year-round oocyte and sperm maturation and release. Gamete release was observed in the laboratory on all monitoring dates, and most of the female colonies spawned repeatedly for several successive nights. The reproductive features of D. hemprichi constitute an exception to the generalization that free-spawning reef-corals have brief and synchronized broadcast-spawning episodes. This species demonstrates early onset of first reproduction, which further increases its reproductive output.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=0030864232&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/s002270050198
DO - 10.1007/s002270050198
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AN - SCOPUS:0030864232
SN - 0025-3162
VL - 129
SP - 573
EP - 579
JO - Marine Biology
JF - Marine Biology
IS - 4
ER -