| Leptolinae | |
|---|---|
| Siphonophorae from Ernst Haeckel's 1904 Kunstformen der Natur | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Cnidaria |
| Class: | Hydrozoa |
| Subclass: | Leptolinae Haeckel, 1879 |
| Orders | |
| Synonyms | |
|
Hydroida |
|
Leptolinae (or Leptolina) are a cnidarian subclass of the Hydrozoa. They contain the bulk of the paraphyletic "Hydroida" which were one of the main groupings of the Hydrozoa in older classifications and were placed at order rank. They also include, however, the highly advanced colonial jellies of the Siphonophora, which were not included in the "Hydroida".[1]
Some sources (e,g, ITIS use the younger alternate names Hydroidolina or Hydroidomedusa for Leptolina(e).
SUBCLASS LEPTOLINAE
Other hydrozoan classifications, which are beset by paraphyly however, are also often seen. They do not unite the Leptolinae in a monophyletic taxon and thus do not have any merit according to modern understanding of hydrozoan phylogeny.
The traditional 19th-century system had the Leptominae dispersed among the following taxa:
A very old classification that is sometimes still seen had them in:
The system used by Animal Diversity Web uses:
Catalogue of Life uses: