Floridina antiqua (Smitt, 1873)

(Fig. 13; Table 12)

Mollia antiqua Smitt, 1873: 12, pl. 2, fig. 73.

Floridina antiqua: Canu & Bassler 1928a: 60, pl. 6, fig. 1, text-figs 8c, d; Hastings 1930: 715; Osburn 1940: 372; 1950: 102; Shier 1964: 617; Cook 1964: 70, fig. 12; 1968: 151; 1985: 107; Lagaaij 1973: 147, pl. 3, fig. 9; Winston 1982: 125, fig. 38.

Material examined. VMNH. no. 70615, 70616; USNM no. 1283238.

Description. Colonies encrusting calcareous substrata (Fig. 13 A). Zooids small, subhexagonal, with rounded distal ends and angular proximal corners (Fig. 13 B, D). Opesia trifoliate, with deep, laterally directed opesiular indentations and curved proximal edge. Cryptocyst granular, depressed in the center, with raised, more densely granulated margin. Avicularia elongate-rhombic or pentagonal, almost as long as autozooids but narrower and highly acute at the distal channelled end, scattered among autozooids; mandibles dark brown, winged with frontally hooked tips, serrated along inner edge (Fig. 13 D–F). Ooecium endozooidal (Fig. 13 C); opesiae of fertile zooids more elongated, with straight or only slightly curved proximal rim, compared with those of autozooids.

Remarks. The genus Floridina has been very successful, with numerous fossil and Recent species described, although many fossils need modern study for verification. A study of Plio-Pleistocene Western Atlantic Floridina by Knowles (2008) has provided revised descriptions of three fossil species, F. regularis, F. minima, and F. parvicella, and has emphasized the necessity of making the appropriate measurements for taxonomic and paleoecological work.

Distribution. A warm-water species reported from Africa and the Eastern Pacific, as well as the western Atlantic from Cape Hatteras to Florida, the Caribbean and the Gulf of Mexico.