Cliona pocillopora Bautista-Guerrero, Carballo, Cruz-Barraza & Nava, 2006

Material examined. MZUCR.375: Parque Nacional Isla del Coco, 14 m, 4.XI.2011, coll. Jeffrey Sibaja Cordero. Cpo. 23.E: Playa Esmeralda, Bahía Salinas , 5 m, 18.XII.2012, coll. and det. Cristian Pacheco Solano. ICMARES. UES.CI.69: Playa el Faro, Los Cóbanos, El Salvador, <3 m, 24.X.2016, coll. Alejandra Trejo, det. José Luis Carballo .

External morphology. Endolithic sponge in alpha morphology. Small circular papillae on average 600 µm in diameter. Live color not recorded.

Excavation. Multicamerate erosion. Chambers with average diameter of 860 µm (Fig. 16A). Erosion scars 15–66 µm in diameter, with occasional circular ridges and sharp edges (Fig. 16B).

Spicules. Megascleres as small tylostyles and derivates, mostly with subterminal tyles, occasionally far displaced or duplicated, forming tylostyles, tylostrongyles, subtylostyles, and sometimes centrotylote derivates (Fig. 17). Tylostyle dimensions: 72–253 µm (x̅ =146.7, σ=48.0) x 2–16 µm (x̅ =6.8, σ=3.3).

Ecology. Found in Pavona sp. at 14 m depth.

Distribution and previous records. The species was described from the Mexican Pacific (Bautista-Guerrero et al. 2006) and again reported from the same area (Carballo et al. 2008a). The present specimen was collected at Isla del Coco, off Costa Rica and in El Salvador (Fig. 18). Our findings represent a new record for Central America, in particular for El Salvador and Costa Rica.

Remarks. As this species was only recently described in good detail (Bautista-Guerrero et al. 2006), we only provided a short taxonomic account. The tylostyles of C. pocillopora are comparatively short for a clionaid sponge and characteristic in shape, making this identification easy to perform.