Discovery of an alien species of mayfly in South America (Ephemeroptera)

By

Salles, Frederico F.
Gattolliat, Jean-Luc
Angeli, Kamila Batista
De-Souza, Marcia Regina
Gonçalves, Inês Corrêa
Nessimian, Jorge Luiz
Sartori, Michel

Type

Article

Date of Publication

2014

Original Publication

ZooKeys

Volume

399

Pages

1-16

Subjects

Aquatic insects , Baetidae , Cloeon , Ephemeroptera , invasive species , Neotropics

Contributed by

Pensoft Publishers

Language

English

Published by

Sofia, Bulgaria Pensoft Publishers

Identifiers

DOI: https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.399.6680

 

Abstract

Despite its wide, almost worldwide distribution, the mayfly genusCloeonLeach, 1815 (Ephemeroptera: Baetidae) is restricted in the Western hemisphere to North America, where a single species is reported. In the Neotropics, except for some species wrongly attributed to the genus in the past, there are no records ofCloeon. Recently, however, specimens of trueCloeonwere collected along the coast of Espírito Santo, Southeastern Brazil. In order to verify the hypothesis that this species was recently introduced to Brazil, our aim was to identify the species based on morphological and molecular characters and to confirm the presence of true representatives of the genus in the Neotropics. Our results revealed that the specimens found in Brazil belong to the Afrotropical species C. smaeleniLestage, 1924. The identity of the species, its distribution, along with its previous absence in regularly sampled sites, is a clear sign that the specimens ofC. smaelenifound in Espírito Santo are introduced, well established, and that the colonization took place very recently.