Sea lice (Copepoda, Caligidae) parasitic on marine cultured and wild fishes of the Philippines

Abstract

Four species of sea lice were found parasitic on ten species of marine fishes either cultured in the coastal ponds or occurring in the sea water supply canals in the Philippines. They are: Caligus epidemicus Hewitt, 1971 on Acanthurus mata Cuvier), Epinephelus coioides (Hamilton), Glossogobius celebius (Valenciennes), Liza parmata (Cantor), Lutjanus argentimaculatus (Forsskael), Monodactylus argenteus (Linnaeus), Oreochromis urolepis hornorum (Trewavas), Oreochromis mossambicus (Peters), Rachycentron canadum (Linnaeus), and Siganus guttatus (Bloch); Caligus quadratus Shiino, 1954 on L. argentimaculatus and S. guttatus; Lepeophtheirus sigani n. sp. on S. guttatus; and Pseudocaligus uniartus n. sp. on S. guttatus and L. argentimaculatus. These ten species of fishes are new host to C. epidemicus, except for O. mossambicu which has been reported to carry C. epidemicus from Taiwan. Caligus quadratus is new to the Philippines and the two species of fish harboring it are the new host. While L. sigani was found only on S. guttatus, P. uniartus was recovered mostly from S. guttatus, and C. quadratus, largely from L. argentimaculatus. Caligus epidemicus exhibits extremely low host specificity and was found on all species of fishes examined.