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USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

1979

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Reproductive Variability In Lytechinus Variegatus (Echinodermata: Echinoidea) From Different Habitats In A Florida West Coast Estuary, Robert G. Ernest Jul 1979

Reproductive Variability In Lytechinus Variegatus (Echinodermata: Echinoidea) From Different Habitats In A Florida West Coast Estuary, Robert G. Ernest

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Lytechinus variegatus (Lamarck, 1916) is a sea urchin inhabiting shallow sub-littoral environments from Beaufort, North Carolina to southern Brazil. Although it has been collected extensively for embryological material in the southeastern United States (Harvey, 1956; Brookbank, 1968). there have been relatively few studies of its reproduction. Gonad indices were used to follow its annual reproductive cycle at Bermuda and Miami (Moore et al., 1963; Moore and Lopez, 1972), while elsewhere, only observations of spawn- ing have been reported (Boolootian, 1966).

In the Anclote estuary near Tarpon Springs, Florida, Lytechinus is the most conspicuous of the macroepibenthic invertebrates, and where requisite …