Brachiopoda of Greece: an annotated checklist

Abstract

BackgroundUntil today, only scattered species records of Brachiopoda from Greece have been included in publications on the Mediterranean brachiopod fauna. These records were mostly based on material collected during marine expeditions in the eastern Mediterranean decades ago, while few recent additional records appear in ecological studies. The aim of this paper was to give the first checklist of brachiopod species of Greece, in the framework of the Greek Taxon Information System (GTIS) initiative of the LifeWatchGreece Research Infrastructure (ESFRI), by reviewing the existing literature.New informationTwelve brachiopod species have been found in Greek waters so far. The nomenclature, distribution, fossil records, ecology, and literature sources are discussed for each species.

Taxonomic composition and assemblage structure of brachiopods from two submarine caves in the Aegean Sea, Eastern Mediterranean

“…The rhynchonellide Tethyrhynchia mediterranea is reported here for the first time from the Aegean Sea and Greek waters, increasing the regional brachiopod fauna to 13 species (Logan et al 2002;Gerovasileiou & Bailly 2016; this study), and for the second time in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea. It was first discovered in the dark zones of submarine caves along the Mediterranean coast of France and from the Gulf of Tunis (Logan & Zibrowius 1994).…”

“…Interestingly, the cave-dwelling brachiopods Gwynia capsula (Jeffreys, 1859) and Megerlia truncata (Linnaeus, 1767) which occur in the Greek Seas (Gerovasileiou & Bailly 2016) were not recorded in the studied caves despite the high number of samples collected.…”

“…Megathiris detruncata (Gmelin, 1791), a representative of the family Megathyrididae, is one of the most common species in both caves. It is common throughout the Mediterranean and Northeastern Atlantic (Logan 1979(Logan , 1993(Logan , 2003Harmelin et al 2003;Gerovasileiou et al 2015;Sanfilippo et al 2015;Gerovasileiou & Bailly 2016;Bergamin et al 2020). It is characterized by the broadly transverse shell ornamented by rounded ribs (Figure 3(a-d)).…”

“…The remaining five species recorded in the two studied caves have been assigned to another ecological group, the "sciaphilic/coralligenous species" (Rosso et al 2013). For instance, although Argyrotheca cuneata and Joania cordata are the most frequently reported brachiopods from Mediterranean submarine caves (Gerovasileiou & Bianchi 2021), they are also known from a wide variety of low-light habitats (Logan 1979;Gerovasileiou & Bailly 2016;Albano & Stockinger 2019).…”

A brachiopod biotope associated with rocky bottoms at the shelf break in the central Mediterranean Sea: Geobiological traits and conservation aspects

“…A rather common eurybathic rhynchonelliformean brachiopod in the Mediterranean Sea is M. truncata (Linnaeus, 1767). Its geographic range extends to the eastern Atlantic Ocean and occurs at depths between 5 and 800 m ( Alvarez, Emig, & Tréguier, 2017;Anadón, 1994;Brunton, 1988;Çinar, 2014;Emig, 2014Emig, , 2018Gerovasileiou & Bailly, 2016;Logan, 1979;Logan et al, 2004;Logan, Bianchi, Morri, Zibrowius, & Bitar, 2002). In the Recent, M. truncata is generally associated with coarse detritic substrates, hard grounds, and bedrock, and with cold-water coral frames from the circalittoral to bathyal zones (Emig, 2014(Emig, , 2018Fourt et al, 2017;Madurell et al, 2012), their dead shells being abundant in submarine deposits (Remia & Taviani, 2005;Taddei Ruggiero, Buono, & Raia, 2006).…”