Algae of Australia

Lord Howe Island, an oceanic outcrop of volcanic origin situated between Australia and New Zealand, is fringed by the world's southernmost consolidated coral reef. The Capricorn Group of the southern Great Barrier Reef is a series of patch reefs and low coral cays. For more than 30 years Dr Gerry Kraft, along with his students and colleagues, has studied the species-rich marine algal communities of these reefs, paying special attention to subtidal habitats. This authoritative account, documenting the brown algae of Lord Howe Island and the southern Great Barrier Reef follows a highly commended volume on the green algae (2007) and will, in due course, be followed by treatments of the red algae.

This volume includes 7 orders, 12 families, 38 genera and 92 species of benthic brown algae. Richly illustrated with photographs, many of them in colour, it includes an introduction to the islands, identification keys to genera and species and a comprehensive description and discussion of each taxon. The genera Lucasia (Sporochnales) and Herringtonia (Dictyotales) are newly described, as are 29 species of the genera Discosporangium, Feldmannia, Hincksia, Hecatonema, Myrionema, Streblonema, Compsonema, Myriactula, Lucasia, Sphacelaria, Dictyola, Distromium, Lobophora, Padina, Spatoglossum and Sargassum