Morphological description of the first zoeal stage of the tropical xanthid crab Punopeus purpureus Lockington, 1877 (Crustacea, Decapoda, Brachyura, Xanthidae)

Jw Martin,A Rodríguez,Tl Zimmerman

doi:10.7773/cm.v24i2.743

Abstract

The first zoeal stage of the tropical xanthid crab Panopeus purpureus Lockington is described based on larvae from an ovigerous female collected from mangroves on the Pacific coast of Panama. The report is the first description of larvae of any Pacific member of this common and ecologically important genus Morphological features are similar to those of previously described larvae of Panopeus from the Atlantic, with some exceptions noted.

Highlights

INTRODUCCIÓNPanopeus purpureus Lockington, 1877 is a small to medium sized xanthid crab that ranges from the upper Gulf of California, Mexico, and from Cedros Island on the west coast of Baja California, South to Tumbes, Peru (Rathbun, 1930; Brusca, 1980; Abele and Kim, 1989; Hendrickx, 1992, 1995)
Panopeus purpureus Lockington, 1877 is a small to medium sized xanthid crab that ranges from the upper Gulf of California, Mexico, and from Cedros Island on the west coast of Baja California, South to Tumbes, Peru (Rathbun, 1930; Brusca, 1980; Abele and Kim, 1989; Hendrickx, 1992, 1995)
The species is readily identifíed, by morphological features of the adults and by its distinctive purplish brown carapace and reddish brown spotted chelipeds (Rathbun, 1930)

Summary

Introduction

Panopeus purpureus Lockington, 1877 is a small to medium sized (males up to 51.2 mm carapace width; Rathbun, 1930) xanthid crab that ranges from the upper Gulf of California, Mexico, and from Cedros Island on the west coast of Baja California, South to Tumbes, Peru (Rathbun, 1930; Brusca, 1980; Abele and Kim, 1989; Hendrickx, 1992, 1995). The genus contains some 17 species, al of which occur in the Americas, except the eastem Atlantic P. africanus A. Mime Edwards, 1867 (Manning and Holthuis, 1981) and P. lacustris, a westem Atlantic species that has been introduced to Hawaii and possibly California (Williams, 1984b; Abele and Kim, 1989)

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