Pyrgulina nana Hornung & Mermod, 1924

Albano, Paolo G., Steger, Jan, Bakker, Piet A. J., Bogi, Cesare, Bosnjak, Marija, Guy-Haim, Tamar, Huseyinoglu, Mehmet Fatih, LaFollette, Patrick I., Lubinevsky, Hadas, Mulas, Martina, Stockinger, Martina, Azzarone, Michele & Sabelli, Bruno, 2021, Numerous new records of tropical non-indigenous species in the Eastern Mediterranean highlight the challenges of their recognition and identification, ZooKeys 1010, pp. 1-95 : 1

Pyrgulina nana Hornung & Mermod, 1924

New records.

Israel • 2 spcms; Ashqelon; 31.6891°N, 34.5257°E; depth 28 m; 31 Oct 2018; offshore rocky reef; suction sampler; HELM project (sample S59_2F) • 1 spcm; west of Rosh HaNikra Islands; 33.0704°N, 35.0926°E; depth 12 m; 1 May 2018; rocky substrate; suction sampler; HELM project (sample S14_4F) • 5 spcms; same collecting data as for preceding; 29 Oct. 2018; HELM project (samples S52_1F, S52_2F).

Remarks.

Until now, the first record of this species from the Mediterranean was considered to be by Öztürk and van Aartsen (2006), who reported on material obtained from shallow-water sediment samples collected along the Turkish Levantine (Viransehir, Mersin Bay) and Aegean coasts ( Güllük Bay) in 1997 and 2000, respectively. However, already van der Linden and Eikenboom (1992) described and illustrated P. nana from the Levantine Sea (page 60, Figure 41 ), referring to it as Chrysallida spec. C in the lack of a species-level identification. Their material consisted of a single individual, likely an empty shell, but not specified by the authors, from Mersin (south-eastern Turkey) with unknown collecting date, housed in the collection of J. van der Linden (The Hague, The Netherlands). Although we were unable to examine this material, the excellent and detailed line drawing provided enabled an unambiguous assignment of Chrysallida spec. C to P. nana ; thus, van der Linden and Eikenboom (1992) should be regarded the first Mediterranean record. Today, the known Mediterranean distribution of P. nana includes Turkey, Lebanon, and Israel ( Bogi and Galil 2006; Giannuzzi-Savelli et al. 2014). To our knowledge, this is the first record of living individuals of P. nana from Israel; here, the species occurs along both the southern (Ashqelon) and northern coasts (west of Rosh HaNikra Islands) on rocky bottoms at 12-28 m depth.

Figures

Figure 41. Scintilla cf. violescens Kuroda & Taki, 1961, Haifa, Israel: right (A) and left (B) valve outer views, left (C) and right (D) valve inner views, hinge of left (E, G) and right (F, H) valve. Scale bars: 2 mm (A-D); 0.5 mm (E-H).