Brachyura larvae

By Gerhard Pohle, Fernando L.M. Mantelatto, Maria L. Negreiros-Fransozo and Adilson Fransozo

This chapter concerns 328 species of Brachyura that are known as adult from the South Atlantic Ocean. However, only 92 of these species are known with their larval stage(s) also, and therefore dealt with in this chapter with descriptions or illustrations.

Contents
Bl. 1 Introduction
Bl. 2 Field collection
Bl. 3 Laboratory rearing
Bl. 4 Examination
Bl. 5 Identification
Bl. 6 Geographic and bathymetric distribution
Bl. 7 Recognition of the main decapod larval forms
Bl. 8 Zoeal phase
Bl. 9 The megalopa
Bl.10 Key to recognize zoeal larvae of major decapod groups
Bl.11 Identification of first zoea of Brachyura
Bl.12 Identification of megalopa of Brachyura
Bl.13 Acknowledgements
Bl.14 Suggested reading

Identification
The only key available is a key to families for first zoea, which starts at Page 1697: Brachyura larvae: first zoea. Further identification of the zoae has to be carried out then by comparising characters listed in the family tables.
Identification of megalopal stages entirely must be carried out by comparising characters in the concerned family tables. These tables have been placed in a separate module which can be accessed by clicking on the Brachyura Tables icon in the Navigator or by clicking on a direct link to any of the tables (see Table 1 South Atlantic brachyuran species).

Species
See the page for Infraorder Brachyura (and following pages) in the Higher taxa module. For the species, see Cryptodromiopsis antillensis to Troglocarcinus corallicola in the Species module. Note again that only 92 of these species are known with their larval stage(s). Species of which any larval stage is included are listed in Table 14 Species with known larval development.