The bryozoan genus Conopeum (Electridae) in New Zealand, with description of a new species and discussion of the morphological and genetic characters of Conopeum seurati (Canu, 1928)

ABSTRACT

The status of Conopeum Gray, 1848 in New Zealand is clarified, confirming the presence of three living species – one a naturalised alien, one new to science, and a third that is also known in the Pleistocene. Conopeum seurati (Canu, 1928), a Mediterranean-European species, is naturalised at three localities in New Zealand – Opua, Whangarei Harbour and Whanganui Inlet. Conopeum antipodum n. sp., previously confused with C. seurati, is an estuarine species distributed from Kaipara Harbour to Lyttelton Harbour and is also found in Te Whanga Lagoon at Chatham Island (all New Zealand localities). Conopeum oretiensis Uttley, 1951, first described from Foveaux Strait, is known as far north as Kaipara and Manukau Harbours and is known as a Pleistocene fossil from Napier, New Zealand. There is one other solely fossil New Zealand species – Plio-Pleistocene Electra ongleyi Brown, 1952 is transferred to Conopeum. Sequence data from the 18SrDNA locus confirm that Conopeum antipodum n. sp. is resolved within Conopeum and is distinct from C. seurati.

http://www.zoobank.org/urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:4FED6730-1C70-4420-B1DA-F1D9046221DFhttp://www.zoobank.org/urn:lsid:zoobank.org.pub:5C130A99-0869-44A2-885C-338005FBCE07

KEYWORDS:

• Estuarine
• naturalised-alien
• new species
• Pliocene
• Pleistocene
• 18SrDNA

Acknowledgements

The authors gratefully acknowledge the help of Dr Rakia Ayari (Institut National des Sciences et Technologies de la Mer, Tunis, Tunisia), who collected topotypic Conopeum seurati from Wadi Bezirk. Drs Anna Occhipinti Ambrogi, Agnese Marchini and Jasmine Ferrario (Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Pavia), collected specimens of C. seurati from the Po River delta in Italy and sent them to Wellington for gene sequencing. Paul South (Cawthron Institute, Nelson) and Travis Foster (University of Canterbury, Christchurch) sent specimens and/or data concerning Conopeum in the Avon-Heathcote Estuary. Joachim Scholz (Senckenberg Forschungsinstitute und Naturmuseen) sent light-microscopic images (taken by Klaus Breitenbach) of Conopeum aciculatum from South Australia for comparison. We acknowledge support (see under Funding, below) from the New Zealand Ministry of Primary Industries (formerly Biosecurity New Zealand), which enabled the collection of many specimens for this study, and the excellent help provided by curators of the NIWA Invertebrate Collection.

Disclosure statement

No conflict of interest is known by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This research was partly supported by the New Zealand Ministry of Primary Industries (formerly Biosecurity New Zealand) through funding of NIWA’s Marine Invasives Taxonomic Service (contract ZBS2005-24). and the Leverhulme Trust (Research Project Grant Molecules meet Fossils – an integrated approach to studying palaeodiversity, Award No. RPG-2016-429, awarded to AW). Emanuela Di Martino’s contribution was supported by the SYNTHESYS Project, http://www.synthesys.info/, which is financed by European Community Research Infrastructure Action under the FP7 Integrating Activities Programme.