Chaetozone (Cirratulidae) from the Mediterranean Sea

Many specimens of Chaetozone have been recorded from the Mediterranean Sea since the descriptions and figures of the Naples fauna in one of the first comprehensive studies of polychaetes by delle Chiaje, 1823-30. Since then other species have been recorded from the Mediterranean eg Chaetozone caputesocis Saint-Joseph, 1894. However, there is confusion about some of the subsequent records as they are often confused with species from the North Atlantic eg C.setosa. It has been confirmed that Chaetozone setosa Malmgren, 1867 occurs in sub-littoral waters of the North Atlantic with minimum summer temperatures of 10 degrees centigrade (Chambers, Dominguez, Mair, Mitchell and Woodham et al 2007). No records of C.setosa have subsequently been confirmed from the Mediterranean. Recently, attempts have been made to collect benthic material from a few Mediterranean sites and describe the samples in some detail. The purpose has been to confirm the distribution of some Chaetozone species.