I did get a bit of a chuckle both from the article and from Geoff's
comments. I do not understand how the article got into Nature, but I am
grateful that no scientific name was reported; at the level of taxonomic
resolution this goes into the literature, it is unlikely to do much damage.
As many of you know, many eunicids build tubes and glue together
whatever debris is in the vicinity of their tube openings. There was no real
mention of where the worms were from, be advised that if the specimens
came from the Great Barrier Reef, some 20+ species have been reported
from that area in the genus Eunice alone and then in addition, there are
species of Palola, Marphysa, Lysidice etc.
I would also like to mention that "immature" is sort of difficult to determine
since many eunicids reproduce more than once, and are empty of sex
products for long periods of the year. If "immature" means "juvenile" then
that is a completely uncalled for conclusion. If "immature" meant that the
authors could not see sex-products, that is just fine, but without more
detailed information, the two possible conclusions cannot be separated.
Kristian Fauchald
<Fauchald.Kristian at NMNH.SI.EDU>
-- ANNELIDA LIST
Discuss = <annelida at net.bio.net> = talk to all members
Server = <biosci-server at net.bio.net> = un/subscribes
Archives = http://www.bio.net/hypermail/annelida/
Resources = http://biodiversity.uno.edu/~worms/annelid.html
--
