The return of the Blue Crab, Callinectes sapidus Rathbun, 1896, after 70 years from its first appearance in the Gulf of Trieste, northern Adriatic Sea, Italy (Decapoda: Portunidae)

Abstract

Since August 2015, an increasing number of Blue Crabs, Callinectes sapidus Rathbun, 1896, have been reported in the Marano and Grado Lagoon, Gulf of Trieste, in the northern Adriatic Sea. This species is not a new introduction and in fact the first record of C. sapidus in Italy and the entire Adriatic Sea dates back to 1949 in the Grado Lagoon. Interestingly, no other records of C. sapidus have been reported since the first record. Here, we note the re-appearance of C. sapidus in the Gulf of Trieste.

Status of the invasive blue crab Callinectes sapidus Rathbun, 1896 (Brachyura: Portunidae) in Slovenia

“…Such records were reported only during the past five years. It is reasonable to speculate that the blue crab arrived in Slovenian waters from the Italian part of the Gulf of Trieste where it was recently discovered in Marano and Grado Lagoon (Manfrin et al 2016). The second possibility is that the species came from the south, i.e.…”

“…However, Gljuščić (2019) in his Master thesis mentioned a case of the blue crab finding in the vicinity of Šćuza lagoon, near Pomer bay in southern Istria. The third possibility is that the blue crabs recruited to the Gulf of Trieste and Slovenian waters as settled larvae from ship's ballast waters (Manfrin et al 2016). Taking into account recently published data of Benabdi et al (2019) and Shaiek et al (2021) the occurrence of C. sapidus is so far confirmed in 18 out of the 23 countries surrounding the Mediterranean Sea.…”

“…The first record of C. sapidus in the northernmost part of the Adriatic Sea originated before seventy years (Giordani Soika 1951), however, only recently new findings were discovered in the area (Manfrin et al 2016). Such records were reported only during the past five years.…”

“…The blue crab Callinectes sapidus Rathbun, 1896 (Brachyura: Portunidae), is considered an economically important species throughout its native area of distribution (Nehring 2011) which comprises the western Atlantic coast from Nova Scotia to Argentina (Manfrin et al 2016). Its population supports intensive fishery, which currently supplies over one-third of all US commercial blue crab landings (Miller et al 2011).…”

Filling the gap on Italian records of an invasive species

“…The first confirmed record for the Mediterranean is dated back to 1948 (GIORDANI SOIKA, 1951), although its presence was suspected as early as 1935 (NEHRING, 2011). In Italian waters, the majority of records were from the Adriatic and Ionian seas (STASOLLA & INNOCENTI, 2014;MANFRIN et al, 2016;AZZURRO et al, 2019), while in western Italy the species was reported only from Sardinia (PIRAS et al, 2019), Liguria (MAN-CINELLI et al, 2017;SUARIA et al, 2017) and Tuscany (FROGLIA, 2017). With the exception of Sardinia, the area of the Strait of Messina and the northern Tyrrhenian Sea (CAVALIERE & BERDAR, 1975;BISCONTI & SILVI, 2005;GIACOBBE et al, 2019;CULURGIONI et al, 2020), no records were reported from the Tyrrhenian Sea in the wide coastal tract extending from Latium to Calabria.…”