Balanoglossus gigas Fr. Müller rediscovered on the Brazilian Coast

Abstract

THE largest known species of Enteropneusta was discovered by Fritz Müller on the Brazilian coast, at a place named Armação da Piedade, in the State of Santa Catarina. Fritz Müller's notes in which he describes the animal were fortunately collected and published in the year 1898¹ by Dr. Hermann von Ihering, former director of the Museu Paulista of São Paulo. In those notes (p. 36), Fr. Müller said that he caught many tornaria larvæ from 1860 onwards in the plankton off the same beach. The first Balanoglossus was captured in 1884, and in the following year many others were caught. The extraordinary size of the animals (1.5 m. in length) justified the name Balanoglossus gigas. Some of the specimens were sent to Spengel², who gave them in 1893 a new description and re-named them Ptychodera gigas. In a later monograph on the Hemichordata, recently published, van der Horst³ re-described the same animal under the name of Balanoglossus gigas Fr. Müller.