New polychaete (Annelida) records and a new species from Hong Kong: the families Polynoidae, Sigalionidae, Chrysopetalidae, Pilargiidae, Nereididae, Opheliidae, Ampharetidae and Terebellidae

Abstract

During sampling of submarine cave and associated habitats in the eastern waters of Hong Kong in October 2002, polychaetes were found to be a significant and diverse component of the epifaunal and the soft‐sediment benthic marine fauna. Of the families considered herein, eighteen taxa of polychaetes are identified, including at least five new records for Hong Kong (Harmothoe minuta, Iphione ovata, Sthenelais fusca, Neanthes caudata and Arichlidon hanneloreae), and one new species of Sigambra (Pilargiidae). Notes on the identification of these taxa and closely related taxa reported from Hong Kong waters are provided, along with a key to the genera of Chrysopetalidae of the world.

Keywords:

• Annelida
• Polychaeta
• Hong Kong
• marine caves
• Anobothrus
• Arichlidon
• Armandia
• Chrysopetalum
• Harmothoe
• Iphione
• Lanice
• Lepidonotus
• Neanthes
• Nereis
• Parahalosydnopsis
• Perinereis
• Sigambra
• Sthenelais

Acknowledgements

We are inevitably most grateful to the diving team for the collection of this material, to those participants of the 2002 cave expedition who sorted the material and obtained the environmental data (see elsewhere in these proceedings), and to Dr Adrian Glover for relevant literature and Dr Gordon Paterson for comments on the manuscript.