Abstract.Ecology and morphology of Alcyonium (Parerythropodium) coralloides were studied in different sites of the Eastern Atlantic and the Mediterranean. The species is extremely variable in size, colony shape and colour. In the Mediterranean population, encrusting red colonies are mostly encountered, although lobate colonies also exist. White and pink colonies are considered mutants, which tolerate the stable environment of deeper habitats better than the conditions encountered in shallow biotopes. Mediterranean colonies are dioecious and reproduce sexually. In the Eastern Atlantic, lobate pink colonies are the most common form, and show little variability. These (at least partly) parthenogenic populations are considered offspring from stray larvae from more southern regions. This explains the rather patchy distribution of the Atlantic populations, as compared to the widespread distribution throughout the entire Western Basin of the Mediterranean and the Adriatic Sea. A study of the most important systematic characters of the species (growth form, sclerites and solenial network) leads to the conclusion that coralloides belongs to the genus Alcyonium. As a result, coralloides being its type‐species, the genus Parerythropodium will have to be suppresse
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