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Marine recreational fishers accumulate a vast amount of local ecological knowledge (LEK) during their fishing activity that can be of paramount importance for monitoring how climate change affects fish assemblages. We assessed LEK of recreational fishers to investigate the increase in the abundance of 5 northward-expanding indigenous thermophilic fish species in 2 Mediterranean subregions. We accessed LEK through an online survey completed by 794 re- creational fishers (386 from the Adriatic/Ionian subregion and 408 from the Tyrrhenian/Ligurian subregion). The species perceived to have increased most in abundance were Pomatomus salta- trix (71% of replies) followed by Sphyraena viridensis (58%). The remaining species (Sparisoma cretense, Balistes capriscus and Coryphaena hippurus) ranged between 17 and 25%. Recreational fishers have a stable system of beliefs about meridionalization, which is perceived homogeneously between recreational anglers and recreational spearfishers. Our results indicate that latitude is negatively correlated with meridionalization in the Adriatic/Ionian, but not in the Tyrrhenian/ Ligurian Seas, suggesting that meridionalization of the Adriatic/Ionian Seas could be a process that has temporally lagged with respect to the Tyrrhenian/Ligurian Seas. Our study demonstrates that LEK of recreational fishers can be easily accessed on a large geographical scale and can be useful to monitor changes in the distributions of data-limited species such as those studied here.

Juveniles, females, and males of Ophidion rochei share similar external morphology, probably because they are mainly active in the dark, which reduces the role of visual cues. Their internal sonic apparatuses, however, are complex: three pairs of sonic muscles, and highly modified vertebrae and ribs are involved in sound production. The sonic apparatus of males differs from juveniles and females in having larger swimbladder plates (modified ribs associate with the swimbladder wall) and sonic muscles, a modified swimbladder shape and a mineralized structure called the “rocker bone” in front of the swimbladder. All of these male traits appear at the onset of sexual maturation. This article investigates the relationship between morphology and sounds in male O. rochei of different sizes. Despite their small size range total length (133–170 mm TL), the five specimens showed pronounced differences in sound-production apparatus morphology, especially in terms of swimbladder shape and rocker bone development. This observation was reinforced by the positive allometry measured for the rocker bone and the internal tube of the swimbladder. The differences in morphology were related to marked differences in sound characteristics (especially frequency and pulse duration). These results suggest that male calls carry information about the degree of maturity. Deprived of most visual cues, ophidiids probably have invested in other mechanisms to recognize and distinguish among individual conspecifics and between ophidiid species. As a result, their phenotypes are externally similar but internally very different. In these taxa, the great variability of the sound production apparatus means this complex system is a main target of environmental constraints.

This Collective Article presents information about 27 taxa belonging to five Phyla (one Ochrophyta, one Cnidaria, three Arthropoda, two Mollusca and twenty Chordata) and extending from the Western Mediterranean Sea to the Levantine Sea and the Black Sea (Sea of Marmara). The new records were reported from 11 countries as follows: Algeria: occurrence of the African striped grunt Parapristipoma octolineatum; Spain: new records of eight uncommon fish species (Gadella maraldi, Hypleurochilus bananensis, Lobotes surinamensis, Parapristipoma octolineatum, Selene dorsalis, Sphoeroides marmoratus, Tetragonurus cuvieri, and Trachyrincus scabrus) from the Spanish Mediterranean; Italy: new record of the football octopus Ocythoe tuberculata from the Southern Tyrrhenian Sea; a rare sighting of a juvenile phase of a moray eel of the genus Gymnothorax, tentatively identified as Gymnothorax cf. unicolor in the Ligurian Sea; first record of adult Facciola’s sorcerer Facciolella oxyrhynchus in the Adriatic Sea; occurrence of the tope shark Galeorhinus galeus in the Northern Adriatic Sea; Libya: first confirmed record of the pen shell Pinna rudis; first documented record of the palaemonid shrimp Brachycarpus biunguiculatus; first record of the fish Sudis hyalina; Malta: new records of Grant’s rockling, Gaidropsarus granti; multiple concomitant reports of the rare hydro-medusan species Aequorea forskalea; Croatia: a record of the skipjack tuna Katsuwonus pelamis in the Southern Adriatic Sea; Albania: new record of the bigeye thresher shark Alopias superciliosus; Greece: confirmation of the rare brown alga Sargassum flavifolium occurrence in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea; first record of the scaleless dragonfish Bathophilus nigerrimus; Turkey: first occurrence of the calanoid copepod Pteriacartia josephinae in the Aegean Sea; first documented record of the Cremona’s sea slug Placida cremoniana for the easternmost Mediterranean Sea; new record of the yellow-headed goby Gobius xanthocephalus in the Sea of Marmara; Cyprus: first record of the Liechtenstein’s goby Corcyrogobius liechtensteini; an individual of the Yellow-fin tuna Thunnus albacares captured with handline by an artisanal fisher; Lebanon: an individual of the Black marlin Istiompax indica captured in a gill net., peer-reviewed

Marine bioinvasions require integrating monitoring tools with other complementary strategies. In this study, we collected information about the invasive alien crab Callinectes sapidus in Italy, Croatia and Montenegro, by means of online questionnaires administered to recreational fishers (n = 797). Our records matched the current distribution of the species: C. sapidus resulted far more common in the Adriatic/Ionian than in the Tyrrhenian/Ligurian sector. Most respondents rated the species as ‘occasional’ or ‘rare’. Moreover, the more C. sapidus was considered to be abundant, the more fishers tended to perceive it as a negative disturbance over fisheries and the environment. Our findings suggest that C. sapidus is more common than previously thought in most of the study area, and it could have reached the levels of a true invasions in the south-eastern Adriatic Sea. This experience demonstrates that online questionnaires can be appropriate tools to effectively engage stakeholders in alien species monitoring.

WOS: 000504749700017, This paper is a collection of novel distributional records of 20 species belonging to 8 phyla (Chlorophyta, Rhodophyta, Cnidaria, Ctenophora, Annelida, Mollusca, Arthropoda and Chordata) from 11 Mediterranean countries, namely, Spain: an additional record of the Canary dentex Dentex canariensis is reported from Spain (Valencia), this is the northernmost record of this species in the Mediterranean; Algeria: the first documented record of Caulerpa chemnitzia is reported from the Algerian coast; France: the first record of the Spotted sea hare Aplysia dactylomela is reported from the eastern coast of Corsica; Italy: the first records of the Lessepsian polychaete Dorvillea similis and the alien bivalve Isognomon legumen are reported from Italian waters while additional records of Mnemiopsis leidyi in the south Adriatic are provided; Libya: the first record of an alien mollusc Crepidula fornicata is reported from Libyan waters; Malta: multiple sightings of gelatinous species Apolemia uvaria, Phacellophora camtschatica and Physophora hydrostatica are reported for the first time from Maltese waters, as well as the first tentative record of the Orange-spotted grouper Epinephelus cfr. coioides; Greece: an occurrence of a rare Bigeye thresher shark Alopias superciliosus is reported from Hellenic Ionian waters, while the first records of the alien Mertens' prawn-goby Vanderhorstia mertensi, the recently described cyclopoid copepod Oithona davisae and the alien red seaweed Asparagopsis armata are reported from the Aegean Sea. The presence of the micromollusc Euthymella colzumensis is confirmed for Greece; Cyprus: the first record of the red cornetfish Fistularia petimba is reported from Cyprus; Turkey: the first record of the alien jellyfish Marivagia stellata is reported from south-eastern Turkey; Israel: the first records of the sea nettle Chrysaora sp. in the Levant are reported., International Ocean Institute (IOI); Croatian Science Foundation (HRZZ) [IP-2016-06-5251]; Regione Autonoma Friuli Venezia Giulia; Israel Society of Ecology and Environmental Sciences; GoJelly project-EU Horizon 2020 [774499], Langeneck J. and Tempesti J. are grateful to M. El-Metwally and J. Ferrario for providing Red Sea specimens of D. similis, and to M. Lezzi for his support in the preparation of permanent slides. Deidun A. and Piraino S. wish to thank Mr. Pete Bullen (www.oceanfoto.co.uk), Roy Davidson, Hans Messler, Alexander Ferrante and Lyndsey Bee for making their photographs of the three gelatinous species in caption available to the authors, as well as to the International Ocean Institute (IOI) for sponsoring the Spot the Jellyfish campaign since 2010. Thanks are also due to Andre C. Morandini (Brasil) for supporting advice on P. camtschatica identification. Deidun A. and Zava B. are indebted to the angler Romario Pace for donating the photo of the fish individual reported hereunder. Dragicevic B. and Dulcic J. are thankful to Mr. Nikola Cvitan who provided photographs and videos of the specimen as well as additional information. Their work was partly supported by the Croatian Science Foundation (HRZZ) under project IP-2016-06-5251. Tirelli V. and Goruppi A. wish to thank the citizen scientists for providing sightings and photographic material through avvistAPP (Michele Cravati, V. D., Vincenzo Frezza, S. I., R. M., S. M., I. T. and C. V.) and the Regione Autonoma Friuli Venezia Giulia for funding the NOCE di MARE project. Michailidis N. and Manitaras I. thank fishmonger George Karamanos and fisher Christos Efrem for providing the specimen and information on its catch. Edelist D., Kuplik Z., Guy-Haim T. and Angel D. thank Dror Gilat and Inbar Margulis for recording and sharing their observations, and Mark J Gibbons, Andre C Morandini and Stefano Piraino for their useful taxonomic contributions. "Medusot Baam" is funded by the Israel Society of Ecology and Environmental Sciences, as well as the GoJelly project -EU Horizon 2020 grant No 774499.

In the present article, new records are given for 15 species (4 native and 9 alien and 2 cryptogenic), belonging to 6 Phyla (i.e. Chlorophyta, Ctenophora, Cnidaria, Mollusca, Arthropoda, and Chordata), from 10 Mediterranean countries: Morocco: the finding of the crab Callinectes sapidus represents the westernmost one of the species in the Mediterranean; Italy: first records of the nudibranch Polycera hedgpethi from the harbour of La Spezia, and first finding of the invasive ctenophore Mnemiopsis leidyi in the Fiora River; Tunisia: Caulerpa taxifolia var. distichophylla is recorded for the first time, showing an even wider distribution in the Mediterranean; Greece: the finding of the jellyfish Pelagia benovici represents the first record of the species in the Ionian Sea, while the finding of the smallscale codlet Bregmaceros nectabanus in the Ionian Sea is another interesting first report for the area; Malta: the cryptogenic scleractinian coral Oculina patagonica was recorded; Slovenia: the parasitic copepod Demoleus heptapus was recorded from a sixgill bluntnose shark, Hexanchus griseus; Croatia: the Lessepsian cephalaspidean mollusc Haminoea cyanomarginata is recorded for the first time from the area; Bulgaria: the Asian date mussel Arcuatula senhousia was recorded from the Black Sea; Cyprus: the Lessepsian gastropod Viriola sp. [cf. corrugata) was recorded for the first time from the area, while two decapod species were recorded also for the first time from Cyprus, i.e. the caridean shrimp Pasiphaea sivado and the anomuran Munida curvimana; Turkey: the acari Lohmannella falcata is recorded for the first time from Antalya and the Lessepsian fish Priacanthus sagittarius in the Levantine coasts of Turkey (off Hatay/Arsuz) showing that this species has extended its range in a very short time., peer-reviewed