Abstract
Seven species of free-living poecilostomatoid copepods are recorded from a coastal system in northern Colombia; one of these records, Oncaea scottodicarloi Heron and Bradford-Grieve, is new for Colombia. The poecilostome copepod fauna from the surveyed area is represented mostly by widespread species commonly found in neritic and oceanic waters of tropical latitudes, but local morphologic data are scarce in the regional literature. Brief diagnostic descriptions of the species recorded for the Colombian copepod fauna are provided together with illustrations of taxonomically important appendages, morphologic remarks, notes on the variability of some species, and their distribution.
Highlights
Copepods are a numerically important group in the costal, neritic, and oceanic zooplankton communities (Boxshall and Halsey 2004)
The taxonomic analysis of the poecilostomatoid copepods collected in the surveyed area resulted in the identification of 7 species belonging to 4 families and 5 genera
These are all new records for Rodadero Bay and 1 of them has not been hitherto recorded from Colombian waters
Summary
Copepods are a numerically important group in the costal, neritic, and oceanic zooplankton communities (Boxshall and Halsey 2004). The order Poecilostomatoida has widespread, representative species in these marine habitats. Poecilostome copepods inhabit marine, brackish, freshwater environments and comprise free-living and symbiotic forms (Melic 2015, Walter and Boxshall 2016). 65 families are recognized as valid (Walter and Boxshall 2016), but only 7 are represented in the marine zooplankton: Clausidiidae, Corycaeidae, Lubbockiidae, Oncaeidae, Sapphirinidae, Paralubbockiidae, and Urocopiidae (Vives and Shmeleva 2010). Members of the first 5 families are known to occur in Colombian waters, with 9 genera and 27 species recorded from different areas of the country (MedellínMora and Navas 2010). The Colombian literature contains some doubtful records (i.e., Corycaeus (Ditrichocorycaeus) subulatus Herrick, 1887, C. The Colombian literature contains some doubtful records (i.e., Corycaeus (Ditrichocorycaeus) subulatus Herrick, 1887, C. (Ditrichocorycaeus) amazonicus F. Dahl, 1894, C. (Agetus) limbatus Brady, 1883, and Sapphirina auronitens Claus, 1863) that need to be confirmed (Medellín-Mora and Navas 2010)
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