Marine biologists have described a new species of the genus Callistoctopus from the waters of southeast China.
Callistoctopus xiaohongxu, live specimen. Image credit: Zheng et al., doi: 10.3897/zookeys.1121.86264.
Callistoctopus is a genus of nocturnal, orange octopuses in the bottom-living octopod family Octopodidae.
It includes over 10 scientifically recognized species; many of them are referred to as night octopuses.
Callistoctopus species occur in tropical and temperate waters of the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific Oceans.
Typically, they are brick red or bright red in color with white spots or blotches forming distinctive patterns on the body.
Some members of the genus, such as Callistoctopus macropus and Callistoctopus ornatus, are harvested for human consumption as seafood.
The newly-discovered species has been mistakenly identified and sold in fish markets of Dongshan Island in Zhangzhou in China’s Fujian province as juveniles of Octopus minor.
Named Callistoctopus xiaohongxu, it is distributed in the East China Sea and the South China Sea.
“The southeast waters of China, due to the influence of strong warm currents, provide ideal environmental conditions to generate abundant marine biodiversity,” said Dr. Xiaodong Zheng and colleagues at the Ocean University of China.
“The finding of Callistoctopus xiaohongxu further confirms the high diversity of species in the southeast China sea.”
The new species has a mantle length of between 4.2 and 8.3 cm (1.7-3.3 inches), smooth skin and reddish-brown color.
“This is the first new species of the genus Callistoctopus to be found in the China seas,” the researchers said.
“We are planning to analyze the mitochondrial genome of Callistoctopus xiaohongxu in the future,” they added.
“Better taxon sampling would facilitate a better understanding of octopod phylogeny as well as a better substantiated generic assignment of Callistoctopus xiaohongxu.”
The discovery is reported in a paper in the journal ZooKeys.
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X. Zheng et al. 2022. Morphological description and mitochondrial DNA-based phylogenetic placement of a new species of Callistoctopus Taki, 1964 (Cephalopoda, Octopodidae) from the southeast waters of China. ZooKeys 1121: 1-15; doi: 10.3897/zookeys.1121.86264
