Caligus cf. temnodontis Brian, 1924

Dippenaar, Susan M. & Sebone, Makwena M., 2025, Caligus (Caligidae: Siphonostomatoida) species off southern Africa with the description of C. pillaii sp. nov., Zootaxa 5686 (2), pp. 151-197 : 176-178

publication ID	https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.5686.2.1
publication LSID	lsid:zoobank.org:pub:FAE3CA10-9DC4-45E0-819E-6F3A02CE7F20
DOI	https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.16987299
persistent identifier	https://treatment.plazi.org/id/5E1F87E2-6C55-9A3C-FF6D-FCABFEC8F8CB
treatment provided by	Plazi
scientific name	Caligus cf. temnodontis Brian, 1924
status

Treatment

Caligus cf. temnodontis Brian, 1924 View in CoL

( Figs 21A View FIGURE 21 – 22C View FIGURE 22 )

Host: Pomatomus saltatrix (Linnaeus) ( Pomatomidae : Scombriformes)

Locality: Off east coast South Africa (Indian Ocean)

Material examined: 6♀ + 3♂

Material collected: 12♀ + 3♂ from P. saltatrix

Voucher material: 2♀ + 1♂ ( SAMC-A099208 ) from P. saltatrix deposited in the Iziko South African Museum , Cape Town, South Africa .

Adult female ( Fig. 21A View FIGURE 21 ) genital complex longer than wide, longer than abdomen (about 1.8 times); abdomen long, indistinctly 2-segmented, genital complex and abdomen combined longer than cephalothorax (about 1.3 times); antenna (a2) with blunt proximal process (arrowed) ( Fig. 21B View FIGURE 21 ), claw (cl) sharply bent ( Fig. 21B View FIGURE 21 ); post-antennal process (pap) curved ( Fig. 21B View FIGURE 21 ); small conical process (cp) between bases of antenna and post-antennal process ( Fig. 21B View FIGURE 21 ); maxillule with blunt dentiform posterior process (mpp) ( Figs 21C, D View FIGURE 21 ); sternal furca (sf) tines divergent, with slightly incurved tips ( Figs 21C, D View FIGURE 21 ); leg 1 first exopodal segment with spinules on posterior margin, last exopodal segment with terminal seta 4 (4) longer than terminal spines (ts), but shorter than segment, small, thin vestige of posterior margin setae (arrowed) ( Fig. 21E View FIGURE 21 ); leg 2 exopodal segments 1 and 2 with long distolateral spines (arrowed) lying obliquely across segments, last segment with small, straight outer spine (os) ( Fig. 21F View FIGURE 21 ); leg 2 first endopodal segment distolateral margin and second endopodal segment outer margin with denticles (arrowed) ( Fig. 22A View FIGURE 22 ); leg 3 first exopodal segment distolateral spine (ds) slightly curved, almost reaching distal margin of second segment ( Fig. 22B View FIGURE 22 ); leg 4 3-segmented with I, IV spines ( Fig. 22C View FIGURE 22 ), distolateral spine (dls) on first segment reaching more than half length of lateral spine (I) on compound segment, outer two terminal spines (II and III) of almost equal length, about half length of inner terminal spine (IV) (cf. Boxshall & El-Rashidy 2009; Özak et al. 2010).

Remarks: The examined specimens of C. cf. temnodontis has a total body length of about 4 mm, which falls within the size range reported ( Boxshall & El-Rashidy 2009; Özak et al. 2010). Differences are found in the length of the genital complex and abdomen with the genital complex about 1.8 times the abdomen length in the current specimens while the abdomen was reported as about the same length as the genital complex (Özak et al. 2010), the claw of the antenna seems more strongly curved than illustrated by Boxshall and El-Rashidy (2009) in fig. 7B and the proximal process seems shorter more similar to that illustrated by Özak et al. (2010) in fig. 1D. The most confusing difference is the length of the vestigial seta on the posterior margin of the last segment of the exopod of leg 1. This seta is very thin and hair-like in the current specimens and difficult to observe (see Fig. 21E View FIGURE 21 ), while those illustrated before are about half the length of seta 4 (cf. Fig. 8F View FIGURE 8 in Boxshall & El-Rashidy (2009) and Fig. 2B View FIGURE 2 in Özak et al. (2010)).

Caligus haemulonis is very similar to current specimens of C. temnodontis regarding the body proportions with the length of the genital complex and abdomen combined about 1.3 times longer than the cephalothorax, the strongly bent antenna claw, the presence of an additional process between the bases of the antenna and the post-antennal process, the presence of single vestigial seta on the posterior margin of the leg 1 last exopodal segment and the length of leg 4 spines ( Boxshall & El-Rashidy 2009). The presence of a pinnate seta on the posterior margin of the last exopodal segment of leg 1 vs the presence a naked vestige of a seta is the character that distinguishes between C. temnodontis and C. haemulonis in the key provided for species of the productus -group ( Boxshall & El-Rashidy 2009), but the presence of a difficult to observe thin, hair-like seta in the current specimens made this distinction very difficult and thus it is recommended that these two species be re-examined for the validity of both. Nevertheless, the current specimens are identified as C. cf. temnodontis based on most of the other distinguishing features as well as features described for the male and the host reports of C. temnodontis .

Caligus temnodontis View in CoL has been reported from P. saltatrix View in CoL off the east coast of South Africa, Indian Ocean ( Boxshall & El-Rashidy 2009; Özak et al. 2010) as well as by Kensley & Grindley (1973) as C. cf. affinis (Özak et al. 2010) View in CoL .