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Lessepsian rabbitfish Siganus luridus reached the French Mediterranean coasts

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Daniel Boris at Agence des Aires Marines Protégées
Daniel Boris
Serge Piro
Serge Piro
Serge Piro
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Eric Charbonnel at Parc Marin Cote Bleue / Marine Park of Cote Bleue
Eric Charbonnel
  • Parc Marin Cote Bleue / Marine Park of Cote Bleue
Bachet F
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Bachet F
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Lessepsian rabbitsh Siganus luridus reached
the French Mediterranean coasts
by
Boris DANIEL (1), Serge PIRO (2), Eric CHARBONNEL (1),
Patrice FRANCOUR (3) & Yves LETOURNEUR (4)
Cybium 2009, 33(2): 163-164.
RÉSUMÉ. - Arrivée sur les côtes méditerranéennes françaises du
poisson-lapin lessepsien Siganus luridus.
Deux individus de Siganus luridus (Rüppell, 1829) ont été cap-
turés par des pêcheurs à Sausset-les-Pins, à proximité de Marseille,
le premier le 9 juillet et le second le 27 septembre 2008. Ceci
constitue une extension considérable de l’aire de distribution de
cette espèce lessepsienne en Méditerranée, où les populations les
plus nord-occidentales étaient connues en Sicile et dans le détroit
de Sicile. L’origine de ces individus n’est pas clairement établie,
bien qu’ils puissent être arrivés avec des eaux de ballast d’un bateau
venant de Méditerranée orientale, de mer Rouge ou du sud-ouest de
l’océan Indien. La possibilité d’une migration naturelle depuis une
population lointaine, comme celle de Sicile, est également discu-
tée.
Key words. - Siganidae - Siganus luridus - MED - Lessepsian spe-
cies - First record.
The rabbitsh Siganus luridus (Rüppell, 1829) is a species usu-
ally found in the western Indian Ocean and Red Sea. Since the
opening of the Suez canal, between the Red Sea and the Mediterra-
nean in 1869, 309 species, called “Lessepsian” species, entered into
Mediterranean waters, including ~75 fish species (Galil, 2009).
Among them, two herbivorous sh species belonging to the Sigani-
dae family, Siganus luridus and S. rivulatus Forsskål, 1775 have
become very common in most parts of the eastern Mediterranean
and strongly interact with native herbivorous sh species through
competition for food resources and habitat (Bariche et al., 2004). S.
luridus was rst recorded in the Mediterranean in 1956 (Ben-Tuvia,
1964) and progressively continued its geographical expansion
through the eastern Mediterranean. The westernmost S. luridus
populations are reported in the north-east of Tunisia (Ktari-
Chakroun and Bouhlal, 1971), the island of Linosa in the Sicily
Strait (Azzurro and Andaloro, 2004) and in Cape d’Orlando, north-
ern Sicily (Castriota and Andaloro, 2005).
The 9th of July 2008, a professional sherman (S. Piro) caught
a specimen of Siganus luridus in his gillnets (~200 m long, with a
mesh size of 13 mm usually used for captures of Mullus spp.) near
Sausset-les-pins (43°19,647 N - 005°07,698 E), at a depth of about
5-10 m in a site mostly characterized by rocky bottoms mixed with
Posidonia oceanica beds (Fig. 1). The sh measured 20.5 cm (TL)
(Fig. 2) and since his capture is maintained alive in the aquaria of
the Parc Marin de la Côte Bleue (its reference number is MNHN
2009-0148). A second individual was caught in the same area by
Notes ichtyologiques / Ichthyological notes
(1) Parc marin de la côte bleue, Observatoire du Parc marin, BP 42, 13620 Carry-le-Rouet, FRANCE.
[boris.daniel@parcmarincotebleue.fr]
(2) 2 rue Bellevue, 13620 Carry-le-Rouet, FRANCE.
(3) Université de Nice Sophia-Antipolis, E.A. 4228 ECOMERS, Parc Valrose, 06108 Nice c e d e x 2, FRANCE. [francour@unice.fr]
(4) Centre d’Océanologie de Marseille, Université de la Méditerranée, UMR CNRS 6540, Campus de Luminy, Case 901, 13288 Marseille
c e d e x 9, FRANCE. [yves.letourneur@univmed.fr]
Figure 1. - Location of the site of Sausset-les-pins (star) where two Siganus
luridus were caught, the 9th of July and the 27th of September 2008.
Figure 2. - Siganus luridus caught off Sausset-les-pins the 9th of July 2008
and maintained alive in the aquaria of the Parc marin de la Côte bleue (ref-
erence n° MNHN 2009-0148).
Siganus luridus reached the French Mediterranean coasts da n i e l e t a l .
164 Cybium 2009, 33(2)
another professional sherman (C. Malaussena) the 27th of Septem-
ber, 2008. He was shing with trammel nets with a mesh size of 9
mm. This second sh was unfortunately not conserved and its size
(18.3 cm TL) was measured from pictures (available from the
authors).
The se captures constitute a considerable extension of the
known distribution range of the species within the Mediterranean,
but the origin of these individuals is not clear and three hypotheses
could be proposed. First, they could result from a release, acciden-
tal or not, from a private aquaria. However, siganids are not very
sought after by local aquariologists and are not found in local /
regional aquaria stores. The release hypothesis is thus not strongly
supported. Moreover, the first specimen seems to be a wild fish,
because it has taken about one month after his catch for eating other
foods than algae in its aquaria. Second, they could have been trans-
ported from another site in the eastern Mediterranean Sea or the
Red Sea through ship-ballast’ waters. The area of capture is close to
two major harbor areas (Marseille and Fos-sur-Mer, see gure 1)
and this hypothesis remains plausible, as it constitutes one of the
major causes of introduction of exotic species, including teleost sh
(Wonham et al., 2000). We are aware that we cannot verify this
hypothesis for S. luridus yet, but a recent work on an exotic gobiid
evidenced transport through vessel ballasts (Goren et al., in press).
Third, these individuals could ‘simply’ be shes coming from a far-
off and non-identied population. Siganus luridus displays a large
home range and is an active swimming species. Thus, one can sug-
gest these individuals might come from a distant population, such
as those found in Sicily, in Linosa Island or even in northeastern
Tunisia. A complementary explanation could be found when con-
sidering the hypothesis of Azzurro et al. (2006) regarding dispersal
dynamics of this species, as they indicated (see also references
therein) that siganid larvae could be dispersed for up ~1000 km.
This could have also been facilitated due to major coastal currents
prevailing in the region, i.e. towards the north / northwest along
Italian coasts, and towards the west from the Ligurian area to the
Provence coasts. Another complementary explanation is to consider
that undiscovered small populations might occur somewhere
between Sicily and the area close to Marseille. We are aware that
any data support this hypothesis and further research is thus needed
to better assess the expansion of this Lessepsian siganid in the west-
ern Mediterranean basin. We should also consider the fact that S.
luridus, a thermophilic species, was found in one of the coldest sec-
tor of the whole Mediterranean. This might suggest that we are fac-
ing an important signal of climatic changes in such area (Boero et
al., 2008).
Acknowledgements. - Greatest thanks are expressed to shermen (S. Piro
and C. Malaussena) for contacting the “Parc marin de la côte bleue” after
the capture of the two individuals, and to the anonymous referees for their
constructive comments on the manuscript. We also thank our colleagues
J.-P. Quignard, J.-G. Harmelin, P. Louisy and O. Torrents for their informa-
tion and comments on this event, and G. Lacroix for her pictures of the sec-
ond individual.
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AZZURRO E., GOLANI D., BUCCIARELLI G. & BERNARDI
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BARICHE M., LETOURNEUR Y. & HARMELIN-VIVIEN M.,
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ern Mediterranean). Env. Biol. Fish., 70: 81-90.
BEN-TUVIA A., 1964. - Two siganid shes of Red Sea Origin in
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Reçu le 13 novembre 2008.
Accepté pour publication le 13 mai 2009.
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  • Jan 2005
  • 1-2
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