Colonisation of the eastern Mediterranean by Red Sea cumaceans, with the description of a new species

Abstract

In samples collected in the course of the national monitoring programme, two interesting cumacean species were collected on the shallow bottoms (6-14 m) of Haifa Bay, Israel. Scherocumella gurneyi, previously known from the Red Sea and the Suez Canal, is recorded for the first time in the Mediterranean Sea. Eocuma rosae is described as a species new to science. Diagnostic characters such as its flattened carapace bearing a sharp marginal carina, the pair of anteriorlycurved acute horns and the pair of dorsal carinae, place E. rosae with other species of the same genus known from the Indo- Pacific Ocean. It is suggested it entered the Mediterranean through the Suez Canal.

Keywords

• cumacea
• scherocumella
• eocuma
• new species
• alien
• erythrean invaders
• red sea
• mediterranean