CHAPTER IV 



MADREPORARIAN CORALS (cOJttiuilcd) 



" Die Corallenthiere sind nicht bloss fiir Naturbeschreibung und 

 Naturgeschichte im engeren Sinne merkwiirdig, sie gehoren zu den 

 zahlreichsten, auffallendsten, unbekanntesten und am einfluss- 

 reichsten Formen des organischen Lebens " — H. Ehrenberg, Abh. 

 Akad. Wiss., Berlin, 1834. 



Family 6. Serl\toporidae 



This family contains only three recent genera — Seriatopora, 

 Pocillopora, and Stylophora. They are found, commonly 

 but not abundantly, on most of the coral reefs of the world 

 except those of the West Indies. The family is of consider- 

 able interest from many points of view, and it is also 

 well defined and easily recognised. There has been a great 

 deal of difficulty in placing it in its proper position among 

 the families of the Madreporarian corals, as in some respects 

 it seems to have affinities with the old group of imperforate 

 corals, in other respects with perforate corals, and again in 

 the presence of very definite tabulae it agrees with some of 

 the extinct corals. 



As the most striking feature of the anatomy of the two 

 genera is the definite restriction of the number of mesenteries 

 and of septa, in the full-grown zooid, to twelve, a feature 

 in which the family differs from all those that have been 

 previously described, and agrees with the Madreporidae 

 and Poritidae, the affinities are probably closer with the 

 perforate corals than with the imperforate. 



Seriatopora and Pocillopora have the following char- 

 acters in common. They are colonial corals, forming pro- 

 fusely ramified shrubby or bushy growths reaching a size 



81 G 



