19. 



of these taxa is frequently not possible. Many delicate pink 

 stalked organisms are found between 100 to 200 meters on the 

 walls of Baltimore Canyon. They appear to be restricted to 

 areas of fine grained sediment and thus are not found in the 

 axis. A possible taxonomic identification could be that they 

 are a type of stalked hydroid. These stalked organisms are 

 gelatinous, so their translucent nature precludes structural 

 determination from photographs. However, occasional shadows 

 indicate that they do have some sort of tentacle crown. 

 Identification was further complicated by the fact that their 

 composition appears to be too fragile to allow retrieval of 

 "voucher" specimens by dredging, since none were recovered 

 during the field program. These stalked organisms were not 

 observed in Lydonia or Oceanographer Canyons. However, no 

 conclusions can be made as to their geographic distribution, 

 because adequate shallow water coverage was not obtained in 

 the northern canyons . 



Another type of organism for which quantification is 

 virtually impossible is a species of the sponge genus 

 Cladorhiza. This sponge occurs in high concentration in all 

 three canyons, and is most common in areas of semiconsolidated 

 clay. In Baltimore Canyon Cladorhiza sp. occurs between 600 

 to 800 meters in the axis and slightly shallower on the walls. 

 The sponge occurs between 200 to 700 meters on both flanks 

 of Lydonia Canyon, with exceptionally heavy concentrations 



