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Abstract
The Cryptoniscidae are epicaridean isopod parasites or hyperparasites of other crustaceans. Liriopsis Schultze in Müller, Citation1859, one of the genera included in this family, now contains two nominal species: L. pygmaea (Rathke, Citation1843) and L. monophthalma (Fraisse, Citation1878). Both of these species infest rhizocephalan cirripeds, which are in turn parasites of hermit crabs. Among the false king crabs, Paralomis granulosa (Jacquinot, 1847), captured commercially in the Beagle Channel in 1996–1998, we found 31 specimens of the rhizocephalan Briarosaccus callosus Boschma, 1930 infested by one or more specimens of L. pygmaea. Neither L. pygmaea nor L. monophthalma has been reported previously for the southern seas. Although unidentified isopod hyperparasites have been found on B. callosus infesting other lithodids from Crozet Islands, South Georgia Island and Canadian Atlantic waters, this is the first time that one of these hyperparasites has been identified as a member of the genus Liriopsis. Since the differences between L. pygmaea and L. monophthalma remain obscure, the epicaridium and cryptoniscus larvae and three females stages of L. pygmaea are herein described from the material collected in the Beagle Channel.
Acknowledgements
The authors thank Dr Gustavo A. Lovrich (CADIC, Ushuaia) for supplying us with the material used in this study, which was collected in surveys funded by the International Foundation for Sciences, Sweden (grant IFS A‐2507/1). Our thanks also go to Dr Mark J. Grygier (Lake Biwa Museum, Japan) for reviewing and offering critical comments on the manuscript, and to Dr Axel O. Bachmann for his help with the German literature. This paper was partially supported by the Universidad de Buenos Aires (grant X019) and the Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET, Argentina).