Grandidierella bonnieroides Stephensen, 1947

Iaciofano, Davide, Mancini, Emanuele, Lubinevsky, Hadas & Brutto, Sabrina Lo, 2024, The amphipod fauna assemblage along the Mediterranean Israeli coast, a spatiotemporal overview, Ecologica Montenegrina 80, pp. 244-272 : 251

Grandidierella bonnieroides Stephensen, 1947

Grandidierella bonnieroides is a cosmopolitan circumtropical species distributed in tropical and temperate regions ( Myers 1970, 2009; LeCroy et al., 2009). This aorid is very abundant in the Caribbean and on the tropical west Atlantic coast and to date is recorded in Arabian Gulf, India, South Africa, Indonesia, Mexico, Puerto Rico, Colombia, Cuba, Bahamas, Brazil, and North America ( Myers, 1970; Zimmerman et al., 1979; Stoner, 1980; Heard, 1982; Lalana‐Rueda and Gosselck, 1986; Virnstein and Curran 1986; Stearns and Dardeau 1990; Stoner and Acevedo 1990; Ortiz and Lalana, 1996, 2010; Ortiz and Lemaitre 1997; LeCroy et al., 2002; Satheeshkumar, 2011; Paz-Rios and Ardisson, 2013; Hindarti et al., 2015; Sweatman et al., 2017; Manokaran et al., 2021; Winfield et al., 2023). This species was originally described in the Netherlands Antilles, Caribbean Sea ( Stephensen, 1933). Regarding the Mediterranean basin, it has recently been reported in Israel as a non-indigenous species ( Lo Brutto et al., 2016). How this aorid arrived in Mediterranean water has not yet been determined but the most likely transport vectors could be ballast water and ship fouling ( Lo Brutto et al., 2016).

In its natural areas of distribution, G. bonnieroides is considered a dominant species in estuarine and euryhaline environments ( Stearns and Dardeau, 1990). In addition, this aorid has also been established in intertidal mangroves ( Satheeshkumar, 2011), seagrass meadows such as Stryngodium filiforme, Halodule wrightii and Thalassia testudinum ( Stoner et al., 1980; Virnstein and Curran, 1986; Sweatman et al., 2017), soft bottoms in shallow bays, tide pools ( Heard, 1982) and muddy bottoms with sparse vegetation ( Oliva-Rivera, 1998). Grandidierella bonnieroides can also exploit muddy substrates characterized by low oxygen tension ( Day, 1981).

This species is considered a gregarious “detritus- blanket tube-builder” as it lives inside masses of detritus that are utilised for enrolling themselves in a blanket-like semi-permanent tube ( Thomas, 1976; Barnard et al., 1991). The tube is agglutinating with silk and sediments particles, micro and macroalgae debris and foraminifera ( Barnard et al., 1991; Ortiz and Lalana, 2010). Grandidierella bonnieroides is a subsurface interstitial omnivore deposit feeder ( Manokaran et al., 2021) and is classified as a microphage that feeds mainly on epiphytic diatoms and debris accumulated on vegetation ( Zimmerman et al., 1979). Moreover, this species can change its feeding modes encompassing filterfeeders, grazer, detritivore, and deposit feeders according to food availability ( Thomas, 1976; LeCroy et al., 2002; Reis Filho et al., 2018) and promotes nutrient recycling by reintegrating carbon into trophic networks ( Reis Filho et al., 2018).

Grandidierella bonnieroides is cryptic in colour and behaviour and hides in sediments to reduce its vulnerability to visual predators ( Stoner, 1980). In fact, in estuarine environments, this species is an important food resource for benthic and nektonic species, especially fish, crabs and penaeid shrimps ( Lalana‐Rueda and Gosselck, 1986; Paiva and Da Silva, 1998).

This species is regarded as an opportunistic pollution indicator ( Grizzle, 1984; Barnard et al., 1991) and has been employed in ecotoxicological studies to assess sediment toxicity and the presence of chemical compounds in environments ( Hindarti et al., 2015; Reis Filho et al., 2018). Furthermore, G. bonnieroides is also known to colonize substrates that undergo recurrent defaunation, sometimes forming dense populations ( Santos and Simon, 1980).

The resistance characteristics of this species may have contributed to its successful colonization of Haifa Bay ( Israel), which is characterized by anthropogenic pollution and eutrophication ( Herut & IOLR Scientists, 2022; Lo Brutto et al., 2016). Our analyses revealed the presence of 243 individuals of G. bonnieroides distributed over soft bottoms located at depths between 7.8 and 11.7 m. The species was found with high abundance close to the Haifa harbour, in the only site characterized by the presence of coarse sediment (HM2.1 station, in 2014, 227 individuals); subsequently, a few individuals were found in a site within Haifa Bay, characterized by finer sediments (HM27 station, in 2015, 7 individuals). A single individual was sampled along the Israeli coast in 2016 (H19 station), and, finally, the species was again recorded in 2017 at its first settlement site (HM2.1 station, 8 individuals).