Pseudopolydora floridensis Delgado-Blas, 2008

Radashevsky, Vasily I., Malyar, Vasily V. & Pankova, Victoria V., 2024, Cryptic invasions of Pseudopolydora (Annelida: Spionidae), with description of a new species from Queensland, Australia, Zootaxa 5486 (2), pp. 213-240 : 229-231

Pseudopolydora floridensis Delgado-Blas, 2008

Pseudopolydora floridensis Delgado-Blas, 2008: 14–16 , fig. 5A–L; 2009: 20, fig. 8E. Díaz-Díaz et al. 2016: 29–31, fig. 2l–r. Miranda-Salinas et al. 2016: 1221. Bogantes et al. 2021: 581–582, fig. 2C, D.

Type material. USNM 1073346 (Holotype), ECOSUR (0086, 2 paratypes), USA, Florida, Palm Beach County, Lake Worth , 26.6ºN, 80.0496ºW, coll. Rehrer R., 29 May 1974 .

Other material examined. Belize, Caribbean Sea: USNM 1480641 (1).

Brazil: Bahia, UFBA; Rio de Janeiro, MNRJ P185 (1); São Paulo, ZUEC POL 518–558, 579.

Guadeloupe, Caribbean Sea: MNHNP UE 428 (2).

Full information about the samples is given in the Supplementary Table S3.

Adult diagnostic characters. Adults up to 25 mm long, 1.6 mm wide for about 60 chaetigers. Body and palp pigmentation absent. Prostomium anteriorly bifurcated, posteriorly extending to middle of chaetiger 7 as a low caruncle. Occipital antenna present. Two pairs of black eyes present. Palps as long as 15–20 chaetigers. Chaetiger 1 well separated from peristomium, without notochaetae, with short fine capillaries in neuropodia; small notopodial and well developed neuropodial lamellae present. Chaetiger 4 with anterior-row notochaetae of intermediate shape between winged capillaries of chaetiger 3 and pennoned spines of chaetiger 5; posterior-row notochaetae slender capillaries, same as on chaetiger 3. Chaetiger 5 same in size as chaetigers 4 or 6, with postchaetal lamellae in both rami; dorsal superior capillaries slightly shorter and fewer than those chaetae on chaetigers 4 or 6; ventral capillaries same in size and number as those chaetae on chaetigers 4 or 6; two kinds of heavy spines in notopodia arranged in a U-shaped double row: anterior-row spines with curved pointed tip and characteristic bristles on top, up to 12 in a series; posterior-row spines simple falcate, with bent tip, up to 11 in a series. Posterior notopodia with only slender capillaries. Bidentate hooded hooks in neuropodia from chaetiger 8, up to 25 in a series. Branchiae from chaetiger 7, up to 38 pairs, free from notopodial postchaetal lamellae. Pygidium with two small fleshy lateral lobes, white due to numerous glandular cells. Glandular pouches in neuropodia from chaetiger 1, largest and double in each neuropodium in chaetigers 6 and 7, single in other neuropodia. Digestive tract without gizzard-like structure. Nephridia from chaetiger 4 onwards.

Remarks. Pseudopolydora floridensis was originally described from Lake Worth, Florida, approximately 106 km north of the international seaport of Miami ( Delgado-Blas 2008). It has since been reported from elsewhere in Florida (Fort Pierce, just to the north of its type locality; Bogantes et al. 2021) as well as in Venezuela ( Diaz-Diaz et al. 2016) and Mexico ( Miranda-Salinas et al. 2016). Here we report this species for the first time for Brazil, the states of Bahia, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo (see Table S3). At the same time, we propose that P. floridensis is not native to the American coast, but an Indo-West Pacific species recently introduced to the Atlantic Ocean.

The diverse Pseudopolydora clade is strongly rooted in the Indo-West Pacific ( Radashevsky et al. 2020a, 2021a), with no other native species known from Canada to Argentina in the Western Atlantic Ocean. Instead, several Pseudopolydora species have been introduced by shipping to the Western Atlantic, including three Western Pacific species, P. achaeta , P. paucibranchiata , and P. rosebelae , to Florida alone ( Bogantes et al. 2021). In describing P. floridensis, Delgado-Blas (2008) called attention to its close morphological similarity to Pseudopolydora corniculata Radashevsky & Hsieh, 2000 , an Asian species. Junqueira et al. (2009) indicated that P. floridensis was a synonym of P. antennata , based upon a personal communication from one of us (VIR). However, after the revisions by Bogantes et al. (2021) and Radashevsky et al. (2021a), we no longer consider this to be the case. Of relevance now is that the COX1 sequence (GenBank MW830143) for P. floridensis from Florida, provided by Bogantes et al. (2021), clusters this species, in a blast pairwise alignment, with other Asian taxa, such as Pseudopolydora bassarginensis and P. paucibranchiata (GenBank, accessed January 2023).

The shallow waters of Florida have been invaded by many marine species ( Carlton & Ruckelshaus 1997), as Bogantes et al. (2021) have also noted. All locations where P. floridensis is now known are either under the direct shadow of shipping, along known shipping routes, or are in bays of major international seaports, such as in the Brazilian states of Bahia, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo. The discovery (1970s and later) of P. floridensis in the Western Atlantic, at sites that were well explored many decades earlier (such as along the Atlantic coast of Florida) is suggestive of a relatively recent arrival.

The description of a non-native species as a new species (or mistakenly describing an already-named non-native species as a new species) in its area of introduction falls into a common global pattern ( Carlton 2009). The name P. floridensis further underscores the pitfalls of naming a new species after a geographic location (in this case Florida) in regions known to have high numbers of introduced species. In a similar vein, the isopod Iais floridana Kensley & Schotte , first described from Florida, is another Indo-West introduction ( Carlton 2009), even though not yet detected in its homeland.

We thus suggest that P. floridensis is in fact native to the Pacific Ocean and revise here its biogeographic status to be an established non-native species in the Western Atlantic.

Distribution. Complete information on earlier and new records of P. floridensis is given in Table S3 (mapped in Fig. 13 ).

Figures

FIGURE 13. Map showing records of Pseudopolydora floridensis (see Table S3). Red star—type locality: Lake Worth, Palm Beach County, Florida, USA; green triangle—specimen sequenced for COI by Bogantes et al. (2021); yellow circles—adults identified based on morphology only.