ONUR GÖNÜLAL

New distributional record of Chelonibia testudinaria (Linnaeus, 1758) from the island of Gökçeada, northern Aegean Sea, Turkey

ISSN: 1300-0179
Yayın Aralığı: 6
Yayıncı: TÜBİTAK

A total of 420 specimens of Chelonibia testudinaria (Linnaeus, 1758) were found on two dead loggerhead turtles (Caretta caretta) washed ashore on the island of Gökçeada (northern Aegean Sea). The species is reported for the first time from the Turkish coast of the Aegean Sea and is the second record since 1982 for the Turkish Seas.Chelonibia testudinaria (Linnaeus, 1758) is a cosmopolitan species of barnacle common in warm seas and all over the Mediterranean as an epibiont of marine turtles and other hosts (Newman and Abbott, 1980; Koukouras and Matsa, 1998; Zardus et al., 2014). C. testudinaria is the most often reported sea turtle barnacle and it has been commonly found on Caretta caretta (Linnaeus, 1758) (loggerhead) and Chelonia mydas (Linnaeus, 1758) (green turtle) dating as far back as the Miocene epoch (Blick et al., 2011). The barnacle is considered an obligate commensal with narrow host specialization and is reported from all species of sea turtles (Zardus et al., 2013). Relini (1980) has noted that this species is also rarely found on inanimate objects

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