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Issue: Vol. 3760 No. 3: 3 Feb. 2014
Type: Article
Published: 2014-02-03
DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.3760.3.4
Page range: 369–382
Abstract views: 36
PDF downloaded: 1

First stage zoeal morphology of four ghost crabs Ocypode ceratophthalmus (Pallas, 1772), O. cordimanus Latreille, 1818, O. sinensis Dai, Song & Yang, 1985 and O. stimpsoni Ortmann, 1897 (Crustacea, Decapoda, Ocypodidae)

Institute of Marine Biology National Taiwan Ocean University, Keelung 202, Taiwan, R.O.C.
53, Chenggong 11th St., Zhubei City, Hsinchu County 302, Taiwan, R.O.C.
Center of Excellence for the Oceans, National Taiwan Ocean University, Keelung 202, Taiwan, R.O.C.
Biodiversity Research Center, Academia Sinica, Taipei 115, Taiwan, R.O.C.
Ocypode ghost crabs morphology first zoea

Abstract

Light and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) were used to examine the first zoeal stage of four ghost crabs, Ocypode ceratophthalmus (Pallas, 1772), O. cordimanus Latreille, 1818, O. sinensis Dai, Song & Yang, 1985 and O. stimpsoni Ortmann, 1897. Finding diagnostic characters to distinguish between the four species proved difficult because their setal appendage patterns were identical. However the rectangular and pockmarked patterns on the ventral carapace are rather pronounced in O. ceratophthalmus and O. stimpsoni but weak in O. cordimanus and O. sinensis. The spinulation on the furca of the telson is less in O. cordimanus than in the other three species.