Bopyridae Rafinesque 1815

(SOSA), Senckenberg Ocean Species Alliance, Brandt, Angelika, Chen, Chong, Engel, Laura, Esquete, Patricia, Horton, Tammy, Jażdżewska, Anna M., Johannsen, Nele, Kaiser, Stefanie, Kihara, Terue C., Knauber, Henry, Kniesz, Katharina, Landschoff, Jannes, Lörz, Anne-Nina, Machado, Fabrizio M., Martínez-Muñoz, Carlos A., Riehl, Torben, Serpell-Stevens, Amanda, Sigwart, Julia D., Tandberg, Anne Helene S., Tato, Ramiro, Tsuda, Miwako, Vončina, Katarzyna, Watanabe, Hiromi K., Wenz, Christian & Williams, Jason D., 2024, Ocean Species Discoveries 1 – 12 — A primer for accelerating marine invertebrate taxonomy, Biodiversity Data Journal 12, pp. e 128431-e 128431 : e128431-

Bopyridae Rafinesque 1815

Parasite of

Calcinid and pagurid hermit crabs (Anomura, Paguroidea). Including Pseudionella pumulaensis Williams & Landschoff , sp. nov., there are now 98 species of bopyrid isopods known to parasitise hermit crabs worldwide as ecto- or endoparasites ( Markham 2003, McDermott et al. 2010, An et al. 2016, Detorre et al. 2023, this work). As for many regions of the world, bopyrids have been poorly studied in South Africa ( Williams and Boyko 2012). Based largely on the work of Barnard (1920), Barnard (1940), Barnard (1955) and Barnard 1958, there were 24 described species of epicaridean isopod parasites reported from crustacean hosts, but only two abdominal bopyrid species (and one hyperparasite) known from hermit crabs in South Africa ( Bourdon 1972, Kensley 1978, Grygier 1981, Bourdon 1982, Markham 2005, Markham 2016). Host populations from South Africa are ripe for such studies on these parasites, not only for critical taxonomic work, but also research delving into their potential impacts on ecologically and commercially important hosts.