Invasion History

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

General Invasion History:

None

North American Invasion History:


Description

We are tentatively treating "Bowerbankia gracilis" as a single species of North Atlantic origin, native to both coasts, but introduced to other ocean regions. It was described from Point Judith RI in 1855 (Leidy 1855) and now appears to be fairly continuously distributed from Florida and Spain to Greenland. However, a trans-Atlantic invasion cannot be ruled out. Animals identified as "B. gracilis" over its wide present range could also represent members of a species complex. According to Winston (pers.comm.), Northeast Pacfic "B. gracilis" are probably a separate species (Winston, personal communication; Soule et al., in Carlton 2007)., and are excluded from our database.


Taxonomy

Taxonomic Tree

Kingdom:   Animalia
Phylum:   Bryozoa
Class:   Gymnolaemata
Order:   Ctenostomata
Suborder:   Carnosa
Superfamily:   Vesicularioidea
Family:   Vesiculariidae
Genus:   Bowerbankia
Species:   gracilis

Synonyms

Bowerbankia caudata (Hincks, 1880)
Valkeria caudata (Hincks, 1877)
Vesicularia gracilis (Verrill and Smith, 1874)

Potentially Misidentified Species

Ecology

Food:

Phytoplankton

Trophic Status:

Suspension Feeder

SusFed

Habitats

General HabitatGrass BedNone
General HabitatCoarse Woody DebrisNone
General HabitatOyster ReefNone
General HabitatMarinas & DocksNone
General HabitatRockyNone
General HabitatVessel HullNone
Tidal RangeSubtidalNone
Tidal RangeLow IntertidalNone
Vertical HabitatEpibenthicNone


Tolerances and Life History Parameters

Minimum Salinity (‰)10Field data, Chesapeake Bay (Osburn 1944)
Maximum Salinity (‰)35Field data, Mediterranean Sea lagoons (Occhipinti Ambrogi and d'Hondt 1981), but may tolerate higher salinites.

General Impacts


Regional Distribution Map

Bioregion Region Name Year Invasion Status Population Status
NA-ET3 Cape Cod to Cape Hatteras 1855 Native Established
CAR-VII Cape Hatteras to Mid-East Florida 0 Native Established
CAR-I Northern Yucatan, Gulf of Mexico, Florida Straits, to Middle Eastern Florida 0 Native Established
NA-ET2 Bay of Fundy to Cape Cod 0 Native Established
SA-II None 1941 Crypogenic Established
SA-I None 1965 Crypogenic Established
B-II None 1930 Native Established
B-III None 0 Native Established
B-IV None 0 Native Established
B-V None 0 Native Established
NEA-II None 0 Crypogenic Established
NEA-IV None 0 Crypogenic Established
MED-III None 0 Crypogenic Established
NEA-V None 0 Crypogenic Established
MED-VII None 0 Crypogenic Established
MED-IX None 0 Crypogenic Established
CIO-I None 1968 Non-native Established
CIO-II None 1959 Non-native Established
NWP-4a None 1969 Non-native Established
AUS-VIII None 1974 Non-native Established
AUS-VII None 0 Non-native Established
AUS-VI None 0 Non-native Established
AUS-X None 0 Non-native Established
NZ-IV None 1965 Non-native Established
MED-II None 0 Crypogenic Established
NEA-III None 0 Crypogenic Established
AR-IV None 0 Crypogenic Established
NA-S2 None 0 Native Established
NA-ET1 Gulf of St. Lawrence to Bay of Fundy 0 Native Established
NA-S3 None 0 Native Established
AR-V None 0 Crypogenic Established
AR-III None 0 Crypogenic Established
CAR-II None 0 Native Established
CAR-IV None 0 Native Established
MED-VI None 0 Crypogenic Established
CAR-III None 1939 Native Established

Occurrence Map

OCC_ID Author Year Date Locality Status Latitude Longitude

References

Leidy, Joseph (1855) Contributions towards a knowledge of the marine invertebrate fauna, of the coasts of Rhode Island and New Jersey, Journal of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia <missing volume>: 135-151

Maturo, Frank J. S., Jr. (1957) A study of the Bryozoa of Beaufort, North Carolina and vicinity, Journal of the Elisha Mitchell Scientific Society 72(1): 11-68

Osburn, Raymond C. (1944) A survey of the Bryozoa of Chesapeake Bay, Chesapeake Biological Laboratory Publications 63: 1-55

Waeschenbach, Andrea; Vieira, Leandro M.; Reverter-Gil, Oscar; Souto-Derungs, Javier; Nascimento, Karine B.; Fehlauer-Ale, Karin H. (2015) A phylogeny of Vesiculariidae (Bryozoa, Ctenostomata) supports synonymization of three genera and reveals possible cryptic diversity, Zoologica Scripta <missing volume>: <missing location>

Winston, Judith E. (1977) Distribution and ecology of estuarine ectoprocts: a critical review., Chesapeake Science 18(1): 34-57