Literature Cited 



BIGELOW, H. B., AND W. C. SCHROEDER. 



1948. Sharks. In A. E. Parr and Y. H. Olsen (editors), 

 Fishes of the western North Atlantic. Part One, p. 59- 

 546. Sears Found. Mar. Res., Yale Univ., Mem. 1. 

 CLARK, E., AND K. VON SCHMIDT. 



1965. Sharks of the central Gulf Coast of Florida. Bull. 

 Mar. Sci. 15:13-83. 



FITCH, J. E., AND W. L. Craig. 



1964. First records for the bigeye thresher (Alopias super- 

 ciliosus) and slender tuna ( Allothunnus fallal) from 

 California, with notes on eastern Pacific scombrid oto- 

 liths. Calif Fish. Game 50:195-206. 

 PlENAAR, L. v., AND J. A. THOMSON. 



1969. Allometric weight-length regression model. J. Fish. 

 Res. Board Can. 26:123-131. 



Springer, S. 



1943. A second species of thresher shark from Flor- 

 ida. Copeia 1943:54-55. 

 STRASBURG, D. W. 



1958. Distribution, abundance, and habits of pelagic 

 sharks in the central Pacific Ocean. U.S. Fish Wildl. 

 Serv., Fish. Bull. 58:335-361. 



Charles E. Still well 

 John G. Casey 



Northeast Fisheries Center Narragansett Laboratory 

 National Marine Fisheries Service, NOAA 

 RR 7-A, Box 522-A 

 Narragansett, RI 02882 



EPIZOITES ASSOCIATED WITH 



BATHYNECTES SUPERBUS (DECAPODA: 



PORT.UNIDAE)''2 



The only known documentation of epizoites occur- 

 ring on Bathynectes superbus (Costa 1853) is that 

 of Capart (1951), who noted a stalked barnacle, 

 Scalpellum sp., on specimens from the South At- 

 lantic coast of Africa. This note describes epizoites 

 present on B. superbus from the western North 

 Atlantic Ocean. 



Crabs were obtained from several cruises along 

 the eastern coast of North America (lat. 36°33'N- 

 39°38'N to long. 73°00'W-74°43'W): RV Columbus 

 Iselin (cruise 73-10) from 252 to 335 m; RV Dan 

 Moore (73-030) from 122 to 232 m; RV Albatross IV 

 (74-4) from 236 to 300 m; and RV Eastward (E-2- 

 74) from 280 to 350 m. Gills, branchial chambers, 

 and external surfaces of 172 crabs were examined. 

 Crabs often supported more than one epizoite. 



'Contribution No. 740, Virginia Institute of Marine Science, 

 Gloucester Point, VA 23062. 



^Research supported partly by National Oceanic and Atmo- 

 spheric Administration, Office of Sea Grant (No. 04-3-158-49). 



Crabs were most heavily fouled (65%) with a 

 "'Perigonimus" -like hydroid. Quotations are pres- 

 ent around the name "Perigonimus" because the 

 genus is not valid and is a representative of a 

 poorly known group, the systematics of which 

 need revision (D. R. Calder, pers. commun.). The 

 "Perigonimus" -like hydroid was most frequently 

 found associated with setae along the ventral an- 

 terolateral border and on the ecdysial suture line. 

 Trilasmis (Poecilasma) kaempferi inaequilaterale 

 Pilsbry (Cirripedia: Scalpellidae) was found on 

 13% of thefi. superbus examined. It was present 

 on all exposed regions of the carapace, pereopods, 

 and abdomen. An eastern Atlantic specimen in the 

 U.S. National Museum collections {Geronimo-2- 

 203) had approximately 100 T. k. inaequilaterale 

 on the dorsal carapace, pereopods, eyes, and 

 mouthparts. Anomia aculeata (Pelecypoda) was 

 relatively abundant (14%) and frequently occurred 

 in indentations of the dorsal carapace and on 

 the carinae of pereopods. Other organisms on the 

 carapace were calcareous tubes of an unidentified 

 polychaete (<1%) and Stegopoma plicatile, a the- 

 cate hydroid (<1%). The latter were found along 

 the ventral anterolateral surface of the carapace. 

 No organisms were found within the branchial 

 chamber. 



Figure 1 shows the occurrence of epizoites on 5. 

 superbus according to sex, size group, and molt 

 stage. Size groups of short carapace width (=s35 

 mm, 36-45 mm, 46-57 mm, 2=58 mm) are based on 

 arbitrarily chosen modes from a size-frequency 

 distribution (Lewis 1975). 



Crabs were assigned to molt stages described by 

 Drach and TchernigovtzefF(1967): anecdysis (Ci- 

 C4), proecdysis (DrD4), postecdysis (A1-B2). 



There is apparently no preference of epizoites 

 for male or female crabs, but there is an associa- 

 tion with molt stage and size. As expected, crabs in 

 anecdysis are more heavily fouled than those 

 which have recently molted (A1-B2). Larger crabs 

 (>46 mm) supported a variety of epizoites while 

 those ^35 mm were colonized by Perigonimus 

 only. This may be attributable to the greater sur- 

 face available for epizoite set on larger crabs and 

 the lower frequency of molt for these crabs. 



The epizoites are inhabitants of the shelf-edge 

 upper slope habitat within the bathymetric range 

 of Bathynectes. Trilasmis (Poecilasma) has a 

 known range along the western Atlantic from 

 Martha's Vineyard, Mass. to Key West, Fla., hav- 

 ing been recorded at depths from 21.6 to 1,733 m, 

 chiefly on the carapace of the brachyurans Geryon 



225 



