Notes: Erect cylinders, light purple or bluish. Surface smooth, slighlty shiny, sometimes with spinous conules on top of branches, with level or slightly elevated oscules often with a transparent iris (sometimes completely closed); interior rather cavernous. Its megasclere spicules (strongyles to strongyloxeas) have been compared with sympatric Bahamian Niphates erecta Duchassaing & Michelotti, 1864 (mammiform oxea) and Niphates digitalis (Lamarck, 1814) (hastate oxea), both pictured here. Repent specimens of N. erecta from Stirrups Cay, N Berry Island, Bahamas, have the same spicule complement of co-existing, erect N. alba, but spicules are slightly thinner. Also, the surface has a slightly different aspect (more hispid surface, less oscules).

Author Reference: van Soest, 1980

Link: World Porifera Database