New Alien Mediterranean Biodiversity Records (August 2022)

In this Collective Article on alien and cryptogenic diversity in the Mediterranean Sea we report a total of 19 species belonging to nine Phyla and coming from nine countries. Several of these records concern fish species, and of particular interest are the first records of: Terapon puta for Italian waters; Pteragopus trispilus from Malta; Plotosus lineatus from Cyprus; and the northernmost Mediterranean record of Lagocephalus sceleratus. The northernmost Mediterranean record was also reported for the sea urchin Diadema setosum. The portunid crab Thalamita poissonii was recorded for the first time in Libya. The copepod Pseudodiaptomus marinus was recorded for the first time in the Marmara Sea. The polychaete Branchiomma luctuosum was recorded for the first time from the Mediterranean coast of France. The alien anemone Diadumene lineata was recorded for the first time from Slovenia. The macroalgae Sargassum furcatum was recorded for the first time from Italy. The new Mediterranean records here reported help tracing abundance and distribution of alien and cryptic species in the Mediterranean Sea.
European Union [730984]; ASSEMBLE Plus project; Greek Ministry of Environment and Energy [OPS 5010856]
Francesco Tiralongo and Aylin Ulman are indebted to Francesco Balbini who posted the observation of the species in the Facebook group of the AlienFish project (Fauna Marina Mediterranea) and provided us data ad-ditional on the records. Tuba Terbiyik Kurt, Ximena Ve-lasquez and Tamar Guy-Haim declare that the sampling was performed in the framework of Integrated Marine Pollution Monitoring 2020-2022 Programme carried out by Ministry of Environment and Urbanization/General Directorate of EiA, Permit and Inspection/Department of Laboratory, Measurement and coordinated by TUBI-TAK-MRC ECPI. They also thank Hakan Atabay and Dr. Ibrahim Tan for supplying the zooplankton sample and WGEUROBUS of the International Council for the Ex-ploration of the Sea (ICES)for facilitating this research. Mehmet Goekoglu thanks Hakan Erdoen for the video shoot and Adnan Buyuk for the photo shoot. Joseph A Borg and Julian Evans are grateful to Edward Vella for providing photographs and details on his sighting. The study of Montesanto and Mastrototaro was supported by the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under grant agreement N degrees 730984, ASSEMBLE Plus project. The authors wish to thank G. Chatzigeorgiou and P. Kasapidis for the assistance provided. Sara A.A. Al Mabruk and Fabio Crocetta are grateful to Ashour Al-Slaedie (Libya) for sharing pictures and data of Thalamita poissonii. Jakov Dulcic and Branko Dragicevic are thankful to Mr. Juraj Juricev for provid-ing us data and the photo of the specimen. Daniele Grech was supported by the PO-FEAMP 2014-2020 project ECOGESTOCK Approccio ECOsistemico per la tute-la e la GEStione delle risorse biologiche e STOCK ittici nelle acque interne Priorita 1, Misura 1.44, par. 6 Pesca nelle acque interne e fauna e flora nelle acque interne. The same author would like to thank the colleagues Gianni Brundu, Barbara Loi and Anuta Chindris for field and lab support (IMC, International Marine Centre). The work of Constantinos G. Georgiadis and Dimitra-Lida Rammou has been funded by the Greek Ministry of Environment and Energy within the framework of Marine Strategy monitoring Project (2018-2023; OPS 5010856). The authors would like to thank Dr. Sotiris Orfanidis. The work of Georgiadis and Evangelopoulos has been funded by the Greek Ministry of Environment and Energy within the Marine Strategy Framework Directive. The authors would like to thank Dr. Sotiris Orfanidis. Damla Beton and Mehmet Fatih Huseyinoglu thank the fisher Hasan Sari for providing information and specimens of Plotosus lineatus from Cyprus.