Pomatostegus kroyeri Mörch, 1863

(Figures 7, 12 H)

Pomatostegus krØyeri Mörch, 1863: 399, pl. 11, Fig. 15. Type locality: Punta Arenas, Costa Rica.

Serpula stellata (not Abildgaard, 1789).— Grube 1859: 113 –114 (Puntarenas, Costa Rica); Salazar-Vallejo & Londoño-Mesa 2004: 55 (Tropical Eastern Pacific, checklist).

Cymospire kroyeri .— Quatrefages 1866: 547 (new combination, in disuse).

Pomatostegus stellatus (not Abildgaard, 1789).— Monro 1928: 100 (Taboga, Panamá, 7–9 m, sand and stones); Monro 1933b: 1081 (Balboa, Taboga Island and Coiba Island, Panamá, intertidal to 18 m, on docks, pools at low tide and in sand); Treadwell 1937: 157 (Arena Bank, Gulf of California, 23°29’N, 109°23’30”W; 91 m) ; Fauvel 1943: 30 (Cabo Pulmo, Baja California Sur); Laverde-Castillo 1986: 128 (Málaga Bay, Colombian Pacific); Laverde-Castillo 1988: 91 (Curichichi Island, Málaga Bay, on dead coral and rocks); Salcedo-Martínez et al. 1988: 84 (Zihuatanejo, Guerrero); Salazar-Vallejo 1989b: 200 (Mexican coasts, checklist); Bastida-Zavala 1995: 25 (Cabo Pulmo Reef, Baja California Sur, on coral; 4–17 m); Gómez et al. 1997: 1071 (Tangolunda Beach and La Entrega Beach, Oaxaca, rocks and coral); López-García et al. 1997: 66 ( Coiba Island, Panamá, under rocks); Hernández-Alcántara et al. 2003: 9 (checklist; erroneously cited from Cedros Island, Baja California; they referred to Treadwell’s (1937) record); Salazar-Vallejo & Londoño-Mesa 2004: 55 (Tropical Eastern Pacific, checklist); Bastida-Zavala 2008: 34, fig. 7S (Cabo Pulmo Reef and Loreto Marina, Baja California Sur; 0–17 m) ; Bastida-Zavala 2009: 531 (identification key for Tropical America); Bastida-Zavala et al. 2013: 349 (Oaxaca, checklist).

Pomatostegus kroeyeri .— Bastida-Zavala & Salazar-Vallejo 2000a: 816 (auctore misspelling, see Remarks).

Pomatostegus kröyeri .— Dean 2004: 165 (list of polychaetes from Costa Rica).

Serpula stellatus (not Abildgaard, 1789).— Dean 2004: 165 (list of polychaetes from Costa Rica, referring to Grube 1859).

Pomatostegus krØyeri .—ten Hove & Kupriyanova 2009: 78 (worldwide serpulid checklist).

Material examined. 14 specimens.

Sonora: UANL 7893, 3 spec. ( Marina San Carlos, 27°56’54.5”N, 111°03’17.3”W, July 2, 2011, coll. JAL & ALE).

Baja California Sur: UMAR-Poly 789, 2 spec. (Margarita Island, Magdalena Bay, February 23, 1989); UMAR- Poly 790-OH (Caleritas Beach, La Paz Bay, March 1, 2006, coll. DHP et al.).

Guerrero: UMAR-Poly 791, 2 spec. (Caleta de Chón, 6 m, on Pocillopora damicornis, December 2, 2010, coll. SGG).

Oaxaca: UMAR-Poly 792 (off Centro Mexicano de la Tortuga Aquarium, Mazunte, 2 m, on rock, June 11, 2013, coll. TPP & CVO); UMAR-Poly 793 ( San Agustinillo, on mollusk shell, May 11, 2013, coll. AGM et al.); UMAR- Poly 794 (Camarón Beach, on coral, April 27, 2013, coll. RXP & VHAR); UMAR-Poly 795 (Puerto Ángel, on rocks, May 3, 2010, coll. HSB & APO); UMAR-Poly 796 (San Agustín Beach, 5.8 m, on Pocillopora damicornis, February 23, 2010, coll. RGF & SGG); UMAR-Poly 797 (Montosa Island, 6 m, on Pocillopora damicornis, February 22, 2010, coll. RGF & SGG).

Habitat. Intertidal to subtidal (64 m, Treadwell 1937). Generally below rocks, on live and dead coral ( Pocillopora verrucosa [Ellis & Solander] and P. damicornis), oysters and pier piles (Bastida-Zavala 2008). Occasionally part of fouling fauna.

Distribution. Tropical Eastern Pacific, from Gulf of California to Colombia (Bastida-Zavala 2008).

Remarks. Mörch (1863) named the species as Pomatostegus krØyeri; however, Article 32.5.2.1 explicitly states that a diacritic letter (as “ø”) should be corrected to an “ o ” without slash (ICZN 1999).

Most records of Pomatostegus from the Tropical Eastern Pacific were as P. stellatus, a species described from the Caribbean and generally considered to be a circumtropical species; however, ten Hove & Kupriyanova (2009: 78) suggest on the basis of unpublished data that the Tropical Eastern Pacific P. kroyeri is different from P. stellatus, the latter limited to the American Atlantic (e.g., Bastida-Zavala & Salazar-Vallejo 2000a; a third species, Pomatostegus actinoceras Mörch, 1863, is distributed in the Indian Ocean and Western Pacific (e.g., Kupriyanova et al. 2015).

Mörch (1863: 399) erected Pomatostegus kroyeri for Serpula stellata (not Abildgaard) — Grube, 1859 (p. 113- 114), from Puntarenas (Pacific of Costa Rica). Only since the third decade of the last century was the taxon regularly reported (as P. stellatus) from several localities from Panamá, including the Canal Zone (Monro 1928; 1933b), and from the Mexican Pacific. Except for Panamá (Monro 1933b) and Colombia (Laverde-Castillo 1988) it is not very common. Records from ship hulls or other artificial structures are rare, the Panamá docks (Monro 1933b), two marina piers from Loreto, Baja California Sur (Bastida-Zavala 2008) and San Carlos, Sonora (this work). This might support the hypothesis that the Pacific population is different from that in the Caribbean (ten Hove & Kupriyanova 2009); however a morphological (and DNA) comparison of specimens from both sides of the isthmus is needed to clarify the status of P. kroyeri .