Pelagia noctiluca

Pelagia noctiluca (Forsskål, 1775) Distribution See Fig. 4, Mendoza-Becerril et al. (2025). Notes Five valid species are currently recognised within the genus Pelagia: P. noctiluca, P. cyanella Péron & Lesueur, 1810, P. discoidea Eschscholtz, 1829, P. flaveola Eschscholtz, 1829 and P. panopyra Péron & Lesueur, 1810 (Collins et al. 2025). However, all species, except P. noctiluca, are considered “ species requiring further studies, doubtful ” which highlights the uncertain taxonomy of the group. Pelagia noctiluca is regarded as a species found across many temperate and tropical regions making its presence in the Caribbean plausible. Gómez Daglio and Dawson (2017) discovered a distinct Caribbean lineage, Pelagia sp. 1, from Isla Margarita, Venezuela. Although Gómez-Daglio and Dawson (2017) included Pelagia sp. 1 in their morphological dataset, the PCA results were explicitly reported only for the comparison between P. noctiluca and P. panopyra and no morphological distinctions between Pelagia sp. 1 and P. noctiluca were reported. Considering the oceanographic connectivity in the region, it is possible that this lineage extends into the Mexican Caribbean. Accordingly, although P. noctiluca has been previously confirmed in the Caribbean, the records reported here are treated as tentative assignments and could alternatively correspond to Pelagia sp. 1 or another unresolved regional lineage, pending molecular confirmation (Fig. 5 d).