SEX IDENTIFICATION OF CARCINUS MAENAS BY ANALYSIS OF CARAPACE GEOMETRICAL MORPHOMETRY

LEDESMA FEDERICO,; VAN DER MOLEN, SILVINA; BARÓN PEDRO,

JOURNAL OF SEA RESEARCH

Elsevier

Lugar: Amsterdam; Año: 2010 vol. 63 p. 213 - 216

1385-1101

The European green crab Carcinus maenas is a widely spread invasive species recently introduced to coastal waters of south-eastern South America (Patagonia). Since growth rate (and consequently size at instar) of crabs differs between males and females, finding a method to differentiate crab sex by observation of carapace morphology is necessary to allow the construction of independent SFD´s for each sex. In this work, we examined the shape of carapaces from both sexes of C. maenas, and using elliptical Fourier analysis we successfully tested the existence of morphological sexual dimorphism. Also, we developed a reliable method to identify sexes by visual observation of the carapace.