shore waters of Florida taken during both summer 

 and winter. 



It appears that in the Caribbean region P. hrasi- 

 liensis occupy the nursery grounds at least from 

 December to June. The sampling carried out by 

 Perez Farfante et al. (1961) in Laguna Doctor, 

 Playa de Baracoa, Cuba, showed that small indi- 

 viduals to 95 mm. t.l. were present during two 

 periods each year, March-June and September- 

 December. Individuals up to 110 mm. t.l. were col- 

 lected in January and February, and larger 

 shrimp, 126 to 130 mm. t.l., from March through 

 May. No specimens were taken in July or August. 

 According to Lindner (1957), fishing for the 

 young is usually carried out in the marshes of 

 northern Colombia from January through May; 

 farther east, in tlie Gulf of Venezuela, Ewald 

 (1964, 1965c) found specimens 18 to 23 mm. c.l. 

 from December to June. 



Tremel and Mistakidis (1965) reported that in 

 the State of Santa Catarina, Brazil, P. 'brasiliensis 

 and P. paule7isis are caught in the coastal lagoons 

 from August to April. 



EFFECTS OF TEMPERATURE 



P. irasiliensis seems to prefer waters of rela- 

 tively high temperatures. It is the only one of the 

 four Penaeus in the southeastern Atlantic Coast of 

 the United States that does not invade the colder 

 waters north of Cape Hatteras, and in the South- 

 ern Hemisphere only stragglers seem to wander 

 south of Laguna, Brazil. Furthermore, the densest 

 concentrations of P. irasiliensis are found in the 

 warmest portion of its range. Experiments by 

 Scholander et al. (1953) showed that "Pe?iaet« sp. 

 {brasiliensis)''' could not tolerate temperatures 

 lower than 8° to 12° C, nor those above 35° C. 

 EFFECTS OF SALINITY 



P. brasiliensis, like other species of Penaeus, ap- 

 pears to have a wide range of salinity tolerance 

 during the inshore phase of its life. The meager 

 information available, however, suggests that at 

 least tlie young have a high optimum salinity. 

 Lindner (1957) reported that although the young 

 are fished intensively during the dry season — Jan- 

 uary through May — in Cienaga Grande de Santa 

 Marta, Colombia, the extensive marsli area in 

 northern Colombia between Barranquilla and 

 Santa Marta, they are caught during the entire 

 year wlien rainfall is not heavy and the marsh 

 waters are not greatly diluted. During floods fish- 

 ermen are unable to locate shrimp in the area. 



ENEMIES AND DISEASES 



Iversen and van Meter (1964) published the 

 first record of a parasite in P. brasiliensis. In Bis- 

 cayne Bay they found this shrimp infested with 

 Thelohania duorara Iversen and Manning, the 

 microsporidian that causes the condition known 

 as "cotton" or "milk" shrimp. Infestations of this 

 parasite in P. d. duorarum are common. 



Commercial Importance 



P. bi'asiliensis is important to the fisheries of 

 several Latin American countries, although it 

 ranks lowest among the conunercial Penaeus from 

 West Indies northward. In Biscayne Bay, the 

 only area in the United States where it is known 

 to be significantly represented in the catches, this 

 species may contribute to 41 percent of the shrimp 

 caught during July (Costello, 1963; Joyce and 

 Eldred, 1966). It abounds there in summer and 

 fall. 



This species forms only a very small i^ercent- 

 age of the catches in the Greater Antilles. Milton 

 J. Lindner has informed me that the U.S. boats 

 have been taking spotted pink shrimp in numbers 

 off Contoy, Mexico, for several years. P. brasilien- 

 sis contributes substantially to the catches made 

 off Nicaragua (Croker, 1967; Instituto de Fomen- 

 to Nacional, 1967). Lindner (1957) reported that 

 the young are taken in Cienaga Grande de Santa 

 Marta, Colombia. Ewald (1964, 1965c) stated that 

 it is the least important of the commercial species 

 of Penaeus in western Venezuela, where it is 

 caught only seasonally in the northeastern portion 

 of the Gulf of Venezuela and outside the Gulf 

 proper, north of Cabo San Ramon. P. brasiliensis 

 supports the fishery of Isla Margarita, which, ac- 

 cording to Croker (1967), probably accounts for 

 most of the 236,757 kg. of shrimp taken along the 

 coast of Venezuela, east of the Gulf. 



P. brasiliensis makes up most of the gigantic 

 catches made along the Atlantic Coast of South 

 America, from Guyana to Baia de Marajo, Bra- 

 zil. In 1965, exports to the United States from that 

 area amounted to about 7 million kg. 



This species apparently lias limited commercial 

 value throughout tlie coastal waters of northeast- 

 ern Brazil, but it is important to the fisheries in 

 the neighborhood of Cabo Frio and southward. 

 Da Silva (1965) stated that the young of P. bra- 

 siliensis are the most abundant shrimp in Baia de 

 Guanabara ; offshore the adults make up a relative- 



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U.S. FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE 



