Morphological and genetic analyses of the first record of the Niger Hind, Cephalopholis nigri (Perciformes: Serranidae), in the Mediterranean Sea and of the African Hind, Cephalopholis taeniops, in Malta

Noel Vella,Sandra Agius Darmanin,Adriana Vella

doi:10.1186/s41200-016-0101-y

Abstract

Non-native marine species, including tropical eastern Atlantic fish species are on the increase in Malta, with shipping activities being the main vector for the movement of these alien species from the Atlantic into the Mediterranean Sea. This calls for cooperation and collaboration between various sea-users and researchers to ensure continuous monitoring of coastal biodiversity. Research methods involving local fishermen cooperation in monitoring efforts to identify and track populations of alien species in the Central Mediterranean has led to new records for the genus Cephalopholis (Perciformes: Serranidae) in Malta. Morphological characteristics, meristic counts and mitochondrial DNA sequences from specimens of both species sampled from Maltese waters were analysed to confirm their species identify accurately, essential for tracking their respective population expansions in the Mediterranean. Results from this study have led to confirmation of the first record of the Niger Hind, Cephalopholis nigri (Günther, 1859), in the Mediterranean Sea and of the establishment of the African Hind, Cephalopholis taeniops (Valenciennes, 1828) in Maltese waters.

Highlights

Non-native marine species, including tropical eastern Atlantic fish species are on the increase in Malta, with shipping activities being the main vector for the movement of these alien species from the Atlantic into the Mediterranean Sea
The increase in new records of non-native Epinephelinae species in this region follows the trend noted for a number of other tropical fish groups (Golani 2010; Golani 2013; Vella et al, 2015a, b & 2016a)
These match the descriptions of C. nigri and C. taeniops given by Heemstra and Randall (1993) and Froese and Pauly (2016)

Summary

Introduction

Non-native marine species, including tropical eastern Atlantic fish species are on the increase in Malta, with shipping activities being the main vector for the movement of these alien species from the Atlantic into the Mediterranean Sea. There are non-native tropical Epinephelinae species, including six Indo-Pacific Epinephelus species, E. malabaricus, E. coioides, E. merra, E. fasciatus, E. geoffroyi and E. areolatus, that were first recorded in 1966 (Heemstra and Randall 1993), 1969 (Ben-Tuvia and Lourie 1969; Heemstra and Golani 1993), 2004 (Lelong 2005), 2011 (Bariche and Heemstra 2012), 2015 (Golani et al, 2015) and 2015 (Rothman et al, 2016) respectively Another two Atlantic species, Cephalopholis taeniops, first noted in 2002 (Ben Abdallah et al, 2007), and Mycteroperca fusca, reported in 2010 (Heemstra et al, 2010) were found in the Mediterranean Sea. The increase in new records of non-native Epinephelinae species in this region follows the trend noted for a number of other tropical fish groups (Golani 2010; Golani 2013; Vella et al, 2015a, b & 2016a). The genus Cephalopholis Bloch & Schneider, 1801 is composed of 24 species, 19 of which occur in the Red Sea and the Indo-Pacific region, one is from the eastern Pacific, two from the western Atlantic and two from the eastern Atlantic

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion