Nausithoe maculata Jarms 1990

Nausithoe maculata Jarms, 1990 Distribution See Fig. 1, Mendoza-Becerril et al. (2025). Notes The species reported from the Mexican Caribbean was originally identified as Nausithoe aurea Silveira & Morandini, 1997 by Tovar Juárez (2003); however, that taxon was later synonymised with N. maculata after detailed morphological comparisons (Molinari et al. 2020) and the updated name already appears in the taxonomic list presented by Tovar-Juárez et al. (2025). The type locality of N. maculata is Puerto Rico, whereas that of N. aurea is Ilhabela, Brazil and this suggests that both names have referred to populations from the western Atlantic possibly connected by large-scale ocean currents. In their revision, Molinari et al. (2023) examined a wide range of specimens assigned to N. maculata, including material from Puerto Rico, Belize, Cuba, Brazil and Florida (USA). Most of these specimens lacked depth information and included both wild medusae and individuals reared from polyps collected in shallow water environments. To date, to the best of our knowledge, polyps of N. maculata have not been documented from the Mexican Caribbean, though suitable shallow-water substrates exist and targeted surveys have not been conducted. Taken together, this broad western Atlantic distribution (including multiple sites within the Caribbean) supports the validity of the record reported from the Mexican Caribbean by Tovar-Juárez et al. (2025).