ABSTRACT

Twelve genera and 20 species of epacteriscids are recorded from marine and anchialine caves in tropical and subtropical waters. Nine genera are new: Edaxiella from Jamaica; Enantronia from Lanzarote, the Canary Islands; Balinella, Bofuriella, Bomburiella, Enantronoides, and Oinella from the Bahamas; Gloinella from Cuba; Erebonectes macrochaetus Fosshagen from the Caicos Islands, West Indies is transferred to a new genus Erebonectoides. Six new species of Enantiosis Barr are described, one each from Bermuda, Belize, Galapagos, and Fiji, and two from Palau. Two new species of Epacteriscus Fosshagen are described from Belize and E. rapax Fosshagen is recorded for the first time in Bermuda. New records of Erebonectes nesioticus Fosshagen are made in Bermuda and a habitat division between three species of Epacteriscus, Enantiosis and Erebonectes from Bermuda is suggested. A phylogenetic analysis of described taxa was performed using PAUP. Based on inferences from this analysis two new subfamilies are proposed: the Erebonectinae (to include Erebonectes and Erebonectoides) and the Epacteriscinae (to include all ten other genera).


 

Audun Fosshagen, University of Bergen, Department of Fisheries and Marine Biology, PO Box 7800, N-5020 Bergen, Norway. – Geoffrey A. Boxshall, Department of Zoology, The Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London SW7 5BD, England. – Thomas M. Iliffe, Texas A&M University at Galveston, Department of Marine Biology, Galveston Texas 77553-1675, USA.
E-mail: audun.fosshagen@ifm.uib.no – g.boxshall@nhm.ac.uk – iliffet@tamug.edu

Keywords: Copepoda; Calanoida; Epacteriscidae; anchialine caves; phylogeny; biogeography.