title: Trematodes of fishes of the Indo-west Pacific: told and untold richness.
abstract: The Indo-west Pacific is a marine bioregion stretching from the east coast of Africa to Hawaii, French Polynesia and Easter Island. An assessment of the literature from the region found reports of 2,582 trematode species infecting 1,485 fish species. Reports are concentrated in larger fishes, undoubtedly reflecting the tendency for larger hosts to be infected by more species of parasites as well as a collecting bias. Many hundreds of fish species, including many from families known to be rich in trematodes, have yet to be reported as hosts. Despite some areas (the Great Barrier Reef, Hawaii and the waters off China, India and Japan) receiving sustained attention, none can be considered to be comprehensively known. Several regions, most importantly in East Africa, French Polynesia and the Coral Triangle, are especially poorly known. The fauna of the Indo-west Pacific has been reported so unevenly that we consider it impossible to predict the true trematode richness for the region. We conclude that the greatest gap in our understanding is of the geographical distribution of species in the Indo-west Pacific. This is highlighted by the fact that 87% of trematodes in the region have been reported no more than five times. The reliable recognition of species is a major problem in this field; molecular approaches offer prospects for resolution of species identification but have been little adopted to date.
authors.affiliation: School of Biological Sciences, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Queensland, 4072, Australia. t.cribb@uq.edu.au.
authors.forename: Thomas H
authors.initials: TH
authors.lastname: Cribb
authors.affiliation: Department of Life Sciences, Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London, SW7 5BD, UK.
authors.forename: Rodney A
authors.initials: RA
authors.lastname: Bray
authors.affiliation: School of Biological Sciences, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Queensland, 4072, Australia.
authors.forename: Pablo E
authors.initials: PE
authors.lastname: Diaz
authors.affiliation: School of Biological Sciences, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Queensland, 4072, Australia.
authors.forename: Daniel C
authors.initials: DC
authors.lastname: Huston
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Helminthology, Institute of Parasitology, Biology Centre, Czech Academy of Sciences, Branišovská 31, 370 05, České Budějovice, Czech Republic.
authors.forename: Olena
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Kudlai
authors.affiliation: School of Biological Sciences, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Queensland, 4072, Australia.
authors.forename: Storm B
authors.initials: SB
authors.lastname: Martin
authors.affiliation: School of Biological Sciences, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Queensland, 4072, Australia.
authors.forename: Russell Q-Y
authors.initials: RQ
authors.lastname: Yong
authors.affiliation: School of Biological Sciences, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Queensland, 4072, Australia.
authors.forename: Scott C
authors.initials: SC
authors.lastname: Cutmore
mesh_terms: D063147:Animal Distribution; D000818:Animals; D044822:Biodiversity; D005399:Fishes / Q000469:parasitology*; D019156:Indian Ocean; D010140:Pacific Ocean; D014200:Trematoda / Q000145:classification*