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Opecoelidae (Digenea) in northern Great Barrier Reef goatfishes (Perciformes: Mullidae)

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Abstract

The Opecoelidae (Digenea) of eight species of goatfishes (Perciformes: Mullidae) were studied off Lizard Island on the northern Great Barrier Reef (GBR). Host species included Mulloidichthys flavolineatus (Lacépède), M. vanicolensis (Valenciennes), Parupeneus barberinus (Lacépède), P. ciliatus (Lacépède), P. cyclostomus (Lacépède), P. indicus (Shaw), P. multifasciatus (Quoy & Gaimard), P. spilurus (Bleeker) and P. trifasciatus (Lacépède). Seven opecoelid species were found, of which Paropecoelus corneliae n. sp., Pa. leonae n. sp. and Pseudopecoeloides engeleri n. sp. are described as new. Paropecoelus elongatus (Ozaki, 1928), Pa. sogandaresi Pritchard, 1966 and Podocotyloides parupenei (Manter, 1963) are recorded and a description is provided for each. A second species of Pseudopecoeloides remains unnamed for want of sufficient morphological material. The seven species were distinguished on the basis of morphology and molecular analysis of 56 ITS2 rDNA sequences. Sequences differed by nine to 68 base pairs between species combinations recognised by morphology; no intraspecific variation was detected. Each opecoelid species infected between two and five mullid species, but none of the species has been found in non-mullid hosts. Every mullid species was infected with at least one species of opecoelid and Parupeneus ciliatus had all seven species. The Opecoelidae of GBR goatfishes are consistent with the typical pattern of stenoxenicity seen for trematodes of GBR fishes.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the Australian Biological Resources Study. The authors thank the CReefs Australia Project for providing support. The CReefs Australia Project was generously sponsored by BHP Billiton in partnership with the Australian Biological Resources Study, The Great Barrier Reef Foundation, the Australian Institute of Marine Science and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. CReefs is a field programme of the Census of Marine Life. We thank the staff of the Lizard Island Research Station for their support and Rob Adlard, Tane Sinclair-Taylor and Tony Byrne for assistance in the field. We also thank Terry Miller, Scott Cutmore, Mieke Burger, Ricky Gleeson, Abigail Downie, Nicole Gunter and Janet Hunter for their support in the lab. We thank Dr Takashi Iwaki of the Meguro Parasitological Museum, Tokyo, and Dr Toshiaki Kuramochi of the National Museum of Nature and Science, Tokyo, for examining specimens for us. Terry Miller provided useful comments on an early draft of the paper.

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  1. School of Biological Sciences, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, QLD, 4072, Australia

    Christoph Andreas Rohner & Thomas H. Cribb

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  1. Christoph Andreas Rohner
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Correspondence to Christoph Andreas Rohner.

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Rohner, C.A., Cribb, T.H. Opecoelidae (Digenea) in northern Great Barrier Reef goatfishes (Perciformes: Mullidae). Syst Parasitol 84, 237–253 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11230-013-9404-0

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