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Microcotyle visa n. sp. (Monogenea: Microcotylidae), a gill parasite of Pagrus caeruleostictus (Valenciennes) (Teleostei: Sparidae) off the Algerian coast, Western Mediterranean

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Abstract

Parasite biodiversity of fish of the southern part of the Mediterranean sea is still incompletely explored. We describe here Microcotyle visa n. sp. from the gill filaments of the bluespotted seabream Pagrus caeruleostictus (Valenciennes) (Sparidae) collected off the Algerian coast. The identity of fish hosts was confirmed by barcoding. Microcotyle visa n. sp. is herein described and illustrated. Analysis of the cox1 gene of the monogeneans revealed minor intraspecific variation (1.4%), an order of magnitude lower than the distance between this species and other Microcotyle species (10–15 %). Microcotyle visa n. sp. is distinguished from Microcotyle erythrini van Beneden & Hesse, 1863, a congener infesting sparids, on the basis of morphological (size of clamps, number of testes) and molecular (cox1) differences. This is the fourth member of the genus known to parasitise a sparid host. A species of Paramicrocotyle sp. included in the molecular analysis was nested within a robust Microcotyle + Paramicrocotyle clade; in the absence of demonstrated molecular and morphological differences, we consider that Paramicrocotyle Caballero & Bravo-Hollis, 1972 is a junior synonym of Microcotyle van Beneden & Hesse, 1863 and transfer two species of Paramicrocotyle as Microcotyle danielcarrioni (Martinez & Barrantes, 1977) n. comb. and Microcotyle moyanoi (Villalba & Fernandes, 1986) n. comb.

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Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful to the French Consulate in Algiers. We thank members of the administrative staff of ISYEB, MNHN, for help for the visa, namely Sabrina Permall, Guzide Selcuk-Shahine, Sylvianne Babin and Nora Tagnit-Hamou. The authors are indebted to the staff of LBEIG, Amina Boutellis, Zouhour El Mouna Ayadi and Samia Terkmani for their continued support of our research. Our thanks are also due to fishermen from Regaiia and especially Mohamed Kayrouz. We thank Marcelo Enrique Oliva and John D. Chero for providing references.

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This work was funded by ISYEB, MNHN.

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Bouguerche, C., Gey, D., Justine, JL. et al. Microcotyle visa n. sp. (Monogenea: Microcotylidae), a gill parasite of Pagrus caeruleostictus (Valenciennes) (Teleostei: Sparidae) off the Algerian coast, Western Mediterranean. Syst Parasitol 96, 131–147 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11230-019-09842-2

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