2019 rapid assessment survey of marine bioinvasions of southern new England and New York, USA, with an overview of new records and range expansions

Abstract

A marine bioinvasions Rapid Assessment Survey in August 2019, focused on marina floating pontoons in Rhode Island, Connecticut and New York recorded 21 non-indigenous, 22 cryptogenic and 2 range-expanding species. Five non-indigenous species (NIS) were found at more than 70% of the 10 sampled sites: three ascidians, Botryllus schlosseri (Pallas, 1766) (a probable mixture of introduced and native populations), Botrylloides violaceus Oka, 1927, and Styela clava Herdman, 1881; a crab, Hemigrapsus sanguineus (de Haan, 1835), and a sea anemone, Diadumene lineata (Verrill, 1869). The sea anemone Aiptasiogeton eruptaurantia (Field, 1949), native to the southern United States, is newly reported from New York. The southern U.S. barnacle Amphibalanus subalbidus (Henry, 1973) was detected for the first time in Connecticut in Long Island Sound. It had been six years since the last rapid assessment survey of marinas in Rhode Island and 16 years for marinas in Connecticut and New York. During this six to 16 year hiatus, we found northern range expansions, expansion of recent invaders and generally consistent presence of previous NIS at high levels of occurrence.