Palaemon kadiakensis

Invasion History

First Non-native North American Tidal Record: 2012
First Non-native West Coast Tidal Record: 2012
First Non-native East/Gulf Coast Tidal Record:

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General Invasion History:

Palaemon kadiakensis is native to the interior basin of North America, from the southern Great Lakes region (Lakes Erie, Ontario, southern Lake Michigan) to the Gulf of Mexico (western Florida to northeastern Mexico) (Holthuis 1949a; Strenth 1976; Holthuis 1980). It has undergone a recent range expansion in the Ohio River, from former limits at the Ohio-Indiana border to the vicinity of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (Weisberg 2006; USGS Nonindigenous Aquatic Species Program 2015). This spread could be due to natural expansion, transport by fishermen, aquarium releases, or transport in barge ballast. In 2005, this shrimp was found in the Cosumnes River Preserve, California, at the northeastern edge of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta region, and by 2012 it was caught in the San Joaquin River and Georgiana Slough, where it is considered probably established (Brown and Hieb 2014).

North American Invasion History:

Invasion History on the West Coast:

Palaemon kadiakensis was found in 2005, in the Cosumnes River Preserve, California, at the northeastern edge of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta region. In 2012, a single specimen was caught in the San Joaquin River, and several specimens were reported in the tidal Georgiana Slough, where it is considered probably established. This shrimp is sold in the aquarium trade, which is considered the likeliest vector for its introduction (Brown and Hieb 2014).

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Description

Infraorder characteristics for Palaemon kadiakensis include chelae (movable claws) on the first two pairs of walking legs, and a third thoracic segment overlapping the second segment. Palaemon kadiakensis has a translucent body, a long toothed rostrum and large chelae on the second pereiopods (walking legs). The rostrum is as long as, or shorter than, the carapace and lacks an elevated basal crest. The rostrum has 7 dorsal teeth and 3 ventral teeth. Palaemon kadiakensis is also distinguished from P. modestus and P. macrodactylus by the lack of a mandibular palp, and from P. macrodactylus by the lack of a gastric spine. Maximum length of P. kadiakensis is 53 mm, smaller than P. modestus and P. macrodactylus (at 70-76 mm). Description based on: Holthuis 1949a and Brown and Hieb 2014.

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Taxonomy

Ecology

General:

Life History: In caridean shrimps, the copulating pair is usually oriented at right angles to one another, with the genital regions opposing each other. The modified first and second pairs of pleopods are used to transfer a spermatophore to a receptacle between the thoracic legs of the female (Barnes 1983). After mating, female palaemonid shrimps carry broods of fertilized eggs on their abdomen. These hatch into planktonic larvae with feathery appendages, called zoeae. Zoeae of shrimps lack the prominent spines seen in brachyuran crabs, and look quite shrimplike (Borad and Hubschman 1963). They go through several molts and metamorphose into postlarvae, which have well-developed walking legs. After a subsequent molt, the body takes on the adult shape.

Palaemon kadiakensis has 6 zoeal stages. At temperatures varying from 19.5 to 24C, development to the postlarval stage took 16 to 30 days. The first postlarval stage is a well-formed juvenile shrimp, with well-developed walking legs and pleopods (swimmerets).

Ecology: Palaemon kadiakensis is a widespread freshwater shrimp (Holthuis 1949a; Holthuis 1980), but we have found no reports of its occurrence in brackish waters. Strenth (1976) found that adult P.kadiakensis tolerated salinities up to 20 PSU, and suggested that local dispersal between tributaries through coastal waters was possible, but long-range dispersal through the ocean was unlikely. Larvae developed well in fresh water, but did not progress beyond zoea Stage 3 at 3.5 PSU (Hubschman 1975).

Food:

algae, vascular plants, invertebrates

Consumers:

Fishes

Trophic Status:

Omnivore

Omni

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Habitats

General Habitat	Nontidal Freshwater	None
General Habitat	Fresh (nontidal) Marsh	None
General Habitat	Grass Bed	None
General Habitat	Swamp	None
General Habitat	Tidal Fresh Marsh	None
Salinity Range	Limnetic	0-0.5 PSU
Salinity Range	Oligohaline	0.5-5 PSU
Tidal Range	Subtidal	None
Vertical Habitat	Epibenthic	None
Vertical Habitat	Nektonic	None

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Tolerances and Life History Parameters

Maximum Temperature (ºC)	40	Critical temperature maximum (CTM) for animals acclimated to 32 F (Nelson and Hooper 1982)
Minimum Salinity (‰)	0	This is a freshwater species.
Maximum Salinity (‰)	20	Experimental (80% survival for 1 week, Strenth 1976)
Minimum Reproductive Salinity	0	This is a freshwater species.
Maximum Reproductive Salinity	0	Experimental. Development stopped at Zoea Stage 3 at 3,5 PSU (Hubschman 1975). The limits for reproduction are somewhere between 0 and 3.5 PSU.
Minimum Duration	19	Larval development,19-24 C (Broad and Hubschman 1963)
Maximum Duration	30	Larval development,19-24 C (Broad and Hubschman 1963)
Maximum Length (mm)	50	Holthuis 1949a

General Impacts

There are no known ecological impacts of introduced Palaemon kadiakensis. However, this shrimp is a potential competitor with a native freshwater shrimp (Syncaris pacifica), found in some freshwater streams in the San Francisco Bay drainage (Brown and Hieb 2014).

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References

Barnes, Robert D. (1983) Invertebrate Zoology, Saunders, Philadelphia. Pp. 883

Broad, A. C.; Hubschman, Jerry H. (1963) The larval development of Palaemonetes kadakiensis M. J. Rathbun in the laboratory, Transactions of the American Microscopical Society 82(2): 185-197

Brown, Tiffany; Hieb, Kathryn A. (2014) Status of the Siberian Prawn, Exopalaemon modestus, in the San Francisco Estuary, San Francisco Estuary and Watershed Science 12(1): Published online

de Grave, Sammy; Ashelby, Christopher W. (2013) A re-appraisal of the systematic status of selected genera in Palaemoninae (Crustacea: Decapoda: Palaemonidae), Zootaxa 3734(3): 331-344

Holthuis, L. B. (1949a) Species of Palaemonetes (Crustacea: Decapoda) found in the United States of America, Koninklijke Nederlandsche Akademie van Wederschappen 52(1): 87-95

Holthuis, L. B. (1980) FAO Species Catalogue: Vol. 1. Shrimps and Prawns of the World., Food and Agricultural Organization, Rome. Pp. <missing location>

Hubschman, Jerry H. (1975) Larval development of the freshwater shrimp Palaemonetes kadiakensis under osmotic stress, Physiological Zoology 48(1): 97-104

Mastrototaro, F.; Gasparini, F.; Montesanto, F. (2022) The clubbed tunicate Styela clava has arrived in the Lagoon of Venice, European Journal of Zoology 89(1): 502-509
doi.org/10.1080/24750263.2022.2052989

Mastrototaro, F.; Gasparini, F.; Montesanto, F. (2022) The clubbed tunicate Styela clava has arrived in the Lagoon of Venice, European Journal of Zoology 89(1): 502-509
doi.org/10.1080/24750263.2022.2052989

Nelson, David, Hooper, Deborah K. (1982) Thermal tolerance and preference of the freshwater shrimp Palaemonetes kadiakensis, Journal of Thermal Biology 7: 183-187

Strenth, Ned E. (1976) A review of the systematics and zoogeography of the freshwater species of Palaemonetes Heller of North America (Crustacea: Decapoda), Smithsonian Contributions to Zoology 228: 1-26

USGS Nonindigenous Aquatic Species Program 2003-2024 Nonindigenous Aquatic Species Database. https://nas.er.usgs.gov/



Weisberg, Deborah (8/23/2006) Shrimp- that's right, shrimp! -- found in Monongahela River, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Published online: <missing location>

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