Studies in the Market Sponges I. Growth from the Planted Cutting

Abstract

An account of the chief earlier experiments, from those of Cavolini in 1785 to the close of Moores experiments in Florida in 1905, is given and the general subject of reconstruction and growth in the sponge cutting is described in detail.Under favourable conditions loss of volume in the initial stages, following cutting, should be practically negligible, the early steps in repair and reconstruction proceeding without delay after severance of the fragment from the original sponge. As chief among these, the dermal covering required for newly cut surfaces, the closing of most of the exposed apertures of the old canal system, and the retention of one or more of these for future oscula, are accomplished rapidly and, for preliminary purposes, are completed within a very few days