Family Description:
Tetrasporangia are terminal and cruciately divided. The carpogonial branch is three cells long.

Species description:
This attractive red seaweed is deep red in color with a bluish, iridescent sheen. It has a small, discoidal holdfast, from which grows a clump of thin, soft, leafy blades up to 12 cm (about 5 in) tall. Each fan-shaped blade is slippery to the touch and more or less dichotomously branched into broad lobes.

The cystocarps develop on the surfaces of the blades; each protrudes above the surface and carries a distinctive circle of pointed knobs.

This species was named in honor of Fauche, a French naturalist.

Source:  North Pacific Seaweeds

Synonyms and Alternate Names:
Fauchea laciniata J. Agardh
Fauchea laciniata f. pygmaea Setchell & Gardner 1912b
Fauchea pygmaea (Setchell & Gardner) Kylin 1941