84 Bulletin, Vanderbilt Marine Museum, Vol. IV 



Order: SPINULOSA. 



Family: SOLASTERIDAE. 



Genus : SOLASTER Forbes. 

 Solaster (Crossaster) papposus (Linne). 



Plate 46. 



Type: Linnaeus' type material came from the seas of Europe and 

 Asia. 



Distribution : Known from all over the Arctic region ; found on 

 the American Atlantic coast down as far as Massachusetts Bay; on 

 the American Pacific coasts down as far as Vancouver ; on the Asiatic 

 Pacific down as far as the Ochotsck Sea, and in European seas the 

 Channel is its most southern limit. Bathymetric occurrence: Shore 

 down to about 1200 meters. 



Material examined: Three young specimens dredged in 40 fms., 

 from the middle of St. George's Bay, Newfoundland, September 2, 

 1926. 



Color : Variable, but the more abundant form has the disk purplish 

 red, the arms whitish with a broad, transverse band of red; the oral 

 side is whitish. The less abundant form has the aboral side uniformly 

 deep purple, the oral side creamy. 



Fossil: This species has been found in fossil state in the Leda 

 clay at Montreal, and in the Pleistocene at Green's Creek, near 

 Ottawa, Canada. 



Habits: The development is direct without a Bipinnaria stage. 

 The young are found in spring and summer, not very abundantly 

 on the East American coast, usually on hard bottom in depths rang- 

 ing from tide-line to 40 to 50 fms. 



This starfish is carnivorous and very voracious, frequently devour- 

 ing starfish as large as itself. It feeds principally upon other Echino- 

 derms, chiefly starfishes and sea-cucumbers, but also eats mollusks and 

 anemones. It is definitely known to be an enemy of the oyster. 



Technical description : Rays usually 10 to 12 ; 12 in the present 

 specimens; regularly stellate; disk of moderate size; the dorsal skele- 

 ton composed of narrow bars forming an irregular reticulation sur- 

 rounding moderate sized membraneous spaces in which several rather 

 coarse papulae are situated. No pedicellariae. Dorsal paxillae large, 

 well separated, sparsely covering the surface, with rather long, slen- 

 der spines, clustered, brush-like. Marginal plates obscure. Marginal 



