Maeandropolydora sulcans Voigt, 1965

Diagnose: Eine Maeandropolydora, welche sowohl auf der Innenseite yon Muschelschalen als auch auf der Ausen- bzw. Unterseite von Austern seichte mäandrierende und sich häufig heraushebende Furchen oder Rillen erzeugt. Diese sind häufig in enge gebogene Schleifen gelegt und bei gerippten Schalen nur in die Schalenrippen eingetiefi, während die Furchen von ihnen nicht beriihrt werden.

[Diagnosis: A Maeandropolydora, which creates shallow, meandering and often prominent furrows or grooves both on the inside of mussel shells and on the outside or underside of oysters. These are often placed in tight curved loops and, in ribbed shells, are only deepened into the shell ribs, while they do not touch the grooves]

Diagnosis – (After Bromley & D’Alessandro, 1983, p. 295.) Cylindrical gallery having at least two apertures, irregularly contorted, commonly bent in loops, never showing fusion where walls are in mutual contact; vane absent.
Description – Cylindrical galleries having varying diameter (c. 100-200 μm) in individual specimens. The galleries in each specimen are contorted, branched with at least three apertures and two blind.

Description: M.sulcans in the form of cylindrical galleries with a winding course and local branching.  The borings are typically 5-15mm wide, several centimetres long and more or less horizontal. They are commonly combined with B. triadicus, elongated to winding grooves and U-shaped pouches.

Remarks: Following the diagnosis and descriptions given by BROMLEY & D'ALESSANDRO (1983,1987), M. sulcans comprises cylindrical galleries with two or more apertures, irregularly contorted and bent in loops, with- out fusion and vane. The diameter is constant, and different gradations of complication occur from winding U-borings via branched U-borings to complex winding networks. All these transitions are common in the studied material, with the only difference in their larger size. Size, however, is not regarded as an ichnotaxobase (BERTLING et al. 2006) and thus a designation of these borings as M. sulcans is justified. The series of morphotypes in the examined material ranges from shallow grooves or half-borings on the surface (as described by VOIGT 1965) to complex galleries with pouches (Maeandropolydora decipiens VOIGT,1965). M.sulcans may be part of extensive Balanoglossites systems but commonly occurs in isolation.