Munida valida Smith, 1883

Munida valida is a common squat lobster found from Brazil to New England in depths of 313 to 1823 m (Smith 1883; Pequegnat & Pequegnat 1970; Wenner 1982; de Melo-Filho & de Melo 2001b). We analyzed specimens from the Caribbean and the Gulf of Mexico in depths of 279 to 850 m. Specimens were collected in every month; ovigerous specimens were not collected in January, October or December (Fig. 9 H). One hundred fifty-one males (CW from 6.3 to 27 mm), 155 non-ovigerous females (CW from 4.5 to 24.6 mm), and 12 ovigerous females were measured (CW from 15.5 to 22.5 mm). Males were not significantly larger than females (t-test, df = 317, t = 0.561, p = 0.575) but ovigerous females were larger than non-ovigerous females (t-test, df = 165, t = 3.332, p = 0.001). These results are consistent with previous studies (Wenner 1982). Females had between 56 and 11,800 eggs with average egg diameters of 0.32 to 0.61 mm. Previous reports have fecundity from 3157 to 32,333 eggs with an average egg diameter of 0.56 mm (Wenner 1982). Fecundity was correlated to CW (R2 = 0.608, p = 0.005) (Fig. 10 A), but egg size was not correlated with carapace width (R2 = 0.0120, p = 0.749).