First record of the Indo-Pacific species Electroma vexillum (Mollusca: Bivalvia: Pterioida) in the eastern Mediterranean

Abstract

Iskenderun Bay (north-west Levantine Sea) is intensely industrialized but it is oil pollution that affects most of the coastal and marine ecosystems in the area. Molluscan species diversity in the bay is changing rapidly over the last decades due to the introduction of non-indigenous species of Indo-Pacific origin. To date, 67 of the 181 recorded molluscan species are aliens (37%), a percentage by far higher than anywhere reported. A population of the bivalve Electroma vexillum, whose original distribution is the Indian Ocean and the Red Sea, was encountered and recorded for the first time in 2002 in the discharge canals of the Iskenderun Iron and Steel Factory. The distribution of E. vexillum was very restricted in the canal, presumably limited by the temperature (23–36°C). Its occurrence is attributed to shipping.