Two new species and new host and distribution records of Gnathia Leach, 1814 (Crustacea, Isopoda, Gnathiidae) from Western Australia and the Great Barrier Reef, Australia

Yuzo Ota; Anja Erasmus; Alexandra S Grutter; Nico J Smit

doi:10.3897/zookeys.1193.116538

Two new species and new host and distribution records of Gnathia Leach, 1814 (Crustacea, Isopoda, Gnathiidae) from Western Australia and the Great Barrier Reef, Australia

Zookeys. 2024 Mar 5:1193:125-144. doi: 10.3897/zookeys.1193.116538. eCollection 2024.

Authors

Yuzo Ota¹, Anja Erasmus², Alexandra S Grutter³, Nico J Smit²

Affiliations

¹ San'in Kaigan Geopark Museum of the Earth and Sea, 1794-4, Makidani, Iwami-cho, Iwami-gun, Tottori 681-0001, Japan San'in Kaigan Geopark Museum of the Earth and Sea Tottori Japan.
² Water Research Group, Unit for Environmental Sciences and Management, North-West University, Private Bag X6001, Potchefstroom, 2520, South Africa North-West University Potchefstroom South Africa.
³ School of the Environment, The University of Queensland, St. Lucia, Queensland 4072, Australia The University of Queensland Queensland Australia.

Abstract

Gnathiaantennacrassasp. nov. from seagrass beds off Rottnest Island, Western Australia is the first record of any gnathiid from the entirety of Western Australia; the male can be distinguished from congeners by the stout peduncular articles of the antenna. Gnathiataurussp. nov. is described from two adult specimens reared from praniza larvae found infecting elasmobranch fishes at Heron Island, southern Great Barrier Reef; the males can be distinguished from all congeners by the dorsally strongly elongate mandibles and smoothly rounded mediofrontal process on the anterior part of cephalosome. Gnathiaaff.maculosa Ota & Hirose, 2009 is recorded from Australia, together with further records of G.trimaculata Coetzee, Smit, Grutter & Davies, 2009 and G.grandilaris Coetzee, Smit, Grutter & Davies, 2008, all from elasmobranch fishes.

Keywords: Coral reefs; Heron Island; Lizard Island; Rottnest Island; elasmobranchs; marine fish parasites; taxonomy.

Yuzo Ota, Anja Erasmus, Alexandra S. Grutter, Nico J. Smit.