Check List 14(5): 923-931, doi: 10.15560/14.5.923
Eulimids (Gastropoda, Eulimidae) on the Sea Cucumber Holothuria mexicana (Ludwig, 1875) (Holothuroidea, Holothuriidae) in Belize
expand article infoLeonardo Santos Santos de de Souza‡, Arlenie Rogers§, Jean-François Hamel|, Annie Mercier
‡ Universidade Federal do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (UNIRIO), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil§ Environmental Research Institute, University of Belize, Belmopan, Belize| Society for the Exploration and Valuing of the Environment (SEVE), St. Philips (Newfoundland), Canada¶ Department of Ocean Sciences, Memorial University, St. John’s (Newfoundland), Canada

Corresponding author: Leonardo Santos de Souza ( leosouza2301@gmail.com )

Academic editor: Rodrigo Brincalepe Salvador
© 2018 Leonardo Santos de Souza, Arlenie Rogers, Jean-François Hamel, Annie Mercier.
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the CC0 Public Domain Dedication.
Citation: Souza LS, Rogers A, Hamel J-F, Mercier A (2018) Eulimids (Gastropoda, Eulimidae) on the Sea Cucumber Holothuria mexicana (Ludwig, 1875) (Holothuroidea, Holothuriidae) in Belize. Check List 14(5): 923-931. https://doi.org/10.15560/14.5.923
Open Access
Abstract

This study presents new records for 4 eulimid species (Gastropoda, Eulimidae) including Melanella eburnea (Megerle von Mühlfeld, 1824), Melanella hypsela (Verrill & Bush, 1900), Melanella sp., and Eulimostraca encalada Espinosa, Ortea & Magaña, 2006 found on the body wall of the sea cucumber Holothuria mexicana in Belize. Three of these records (M. hypsela, M. eburnea, and E. encalada) represent a first for the Western Caribbean ecoregion and close a distributional gap for these species in the Caribbean. The geographic distribution of M. eburnea is thereby expanded by ~800 km; M. hypsela by ~1,200 km and E. encalada by ~970 km in the Tropical Northwestern Atlantic province. This article presents for the first time H. mexicana as a new host record for E. encalada.

Keywords
Caenogastropoda; Vanikoroidea; Melanella; Eulimostraca; parasitic gastropods; shell morphology; Caribbean fauna.