Dosima

Dosima fascicularis
Dosima fascicularis stranded at Portrush Strand, Ireland
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Arthropoda
Subphylum:	Crustacea
Class:	Maxillopoda
Infraclass:	Cirripedia
Order:	Pedunculata
Family:	Lepadidae
Genus:	Dosima Gray, 1825 [1]
Species:	D. fascicularis
Binomial name
Dosima fascicularis (Ellis & Solander, 1786) [2]
Synonyms [3]
Lepas fascicularis Ellis & Solander, 1786 Lepas cygnea Spengler, 1790 Lepas dilata Donovan, 1804 Pentalasmis spirulicola Leach, 1818 Pentalasmis donovani Leach, 1818 Anatiffia vitrea Lamarck, Coates, 1829 Lepas fasciculata Montagu, Coates, 1829 Pentalepas vitrea Lesson, 1830 Anatifa oceanica Quoy and Gaimard in Dumont d'Urville, 1832-1835

Dosima fascicularis, the buoy barnacle, is "the most specialised pleustonic goose barnacle" species.^[4] It hangs downwards from the water surface, held up by a float of its own construction, and is carried along by ocean currents.

Flotation

As an adult, D. fascicularis lives attached to a float made either of natural flotsam or of a cement it secretes itself, which has a texture like that of expanded polystyrene foam.^[5] It is the only barnacle to produce its own gas-filled float.^[3] The cyprid larvae are planktonic, and must attach to a float for metamorphosis into the adult form, but the adults are eventually capable of using their own float, sometimes forming aggregations of many individuals attached to a single float. Among the floats used by adult buoy barnacles are pellets of tar,^[6] seaweeds,^[3][7] plastic debris,^[7] driftwood,^[7] feathers,^[3][4] cranberries,^[3] cuttlefish bone,^[3] the "by-the-wind-sailor" Velella velella, seagrass leaves,^[4] Styrofoam,^[6] seeds,^[6] and even apples;^[3] they have even been known to colonise the backs of turtles^[8] and the sea snake Pelamis platurus.^[9] It is a fugitive species, which can be out-competed by other barnacle species, and relies on being able to colonise surfaces and reproduce quickly; after settling on a float, D. fascicularis can reproduce within 45 days.^[10] D. fascicularis appears to be increasing in abundance as a result of anthropogenic marine debris accumulating in the sea;^[6] this source of floats was of "minor importance" in 1974.^[4]

Related species

Although formerly placed in the genus Lepas, the buoy barnacle is now generally placed in its own monotypic genus, Dosima. Dosima is distinguished from Lepas by the form of the carina, and by the exceptional thinness and brittleness of its exoskeleton.^[11]

Distribution

D. fascicularis has a cosmopolitan distribution, with a preference for temperate seas,^[12] having been found at latitudes from 71° North off Siberia to 57° South near Cape Horn.^[3] Groups have been observed journeying from Japan to the Hawaiian Islands in the Pacific Ocean,^[3] and sometimes wash up on westerly and southerly beaches in the British Isles, as well as westerly beaches further south in Europe.^[5][13] It is not normally found in the Mediterranean Sea, but may have begun to colonise there from the Atlantic Ocean.^[14]

References

External identifiers for Dosima fscicularis
EOL	127711
ITIS	656177
WoRMS	106148

	Crustaceans portal
	Arthropods portal

1. ^ "Dosima Gray, 1825". Integrated Taxonomic Information System. http://www.itis.gov/servlet/SingleRpt/SingleRpt?search_topic=TSN&search_value=656083. Retrieved February 27, 2011. 
2. ^ "Dosima fascicularis (Ellis and Solander, 1786)". Integrated Taxonomic Information System. http://www.itis.gov/servlet/SingleRpt/SingleRpt?search_topic=TSN&search_value=656177. Retrieved February 27, 2011. 
3. ^ ^{a b c d e f g h i} Norman E. Weisbord (1979). "Lepadomorph and verrucomorph barnacles (Cirripedia) of Florida and adjacent waters, with an addendum on the Rhizocephala". Bulletins of American Paleontology 76 (306). http://ia310838.us.archive.org/1/items/bulletinsofameri306308pale/bulletinsofameri306308pale.pdf. 
4. ^ ^{a b c d} Lanna Cheng & Ralph A. Lewin (1974). "Goose barnacles (Cirripedia: Thoracica) on flotsam beached at La Jolla, California". Fishery Bulletin 74 (1): 212–217. http://fishbull.noaa.gov/74-1/cheng.pdf. 
5. ^ ^{a b} Guy Baker, Marine Life Information Network for Britain and Ireland (18 November 2006). "Beach life". New Scientist. http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg19225780.130-beach-life.html?DCMP=ILC-arttsrhcol&nsref=specrt13_bar. 
6. ^ ^{a b c d} Dan Minchin (1996). "Tar pellets and plastics as attachment surfaces for lepadid cirripedes in the North Atlantic Ocean". Marine Pollution Bulletin 32 (12): 855–859. doi:10.1016/S0025-326X(96)00045-8. 
7. ^ ^{a b c} Martin Thiel & Lars Gutow (2005). "The ecology of rafting in the marine environment II: the rafting organisms and community". Oceanography and Marine Biology: an Annual Review 43: 279–418. http://epic.awi.de/Publications/Thi2005a.pdf. 
8. ^ The Epibiont Research Cooperative (2007). "A synopsis of the literature on the turtle barnacles (Cirripedia: Balanomorpha: Cornuloidea) 1758-2007". Epibiont Research Cooperative Special Publication No. 1 (ERC–SP1): 62 pp. http://www.seaturtle.org/documents/ERC-SP1.pdf. 
9. ^ Fernando Alvarez & Antonio Celis (2004). "On the occurrence of Conchoderma virgatum and Dosima fascicularis (Cirripedia, Thoracica) on the sea snake Pelamis platurus (Reptilia, Serpentes) in Jalisco, Mexico". Crustaceana 77 (6): 761–764. doi:10.1163/1568540041958536. 
10. ^ W. O. Blankley (1985). "Extreme r-selection in Lepas fascicularis within the Natal offshore fouling community". South African Journal of Science 81: 701.  Cited in Alvarez & Celis (2004).
11. ^ Iván Hinojosa, Sebastián Boltaña, Domingo Lancellotti, Erasmo Macaya, Pabla Ugalde, Nelson Valdivia, Nelson Vásquez, William A. Newman & Martin Thiel (2006). "Geographic distribution and description of four pelagic barnacles along the south east Pacific coast of Chile - a zoogeographical approximation". Revista Chilena de Historia Natural 79: 13–27. doi:10.4067/S0716-078X2006000100002. http://www.scielo.cl/scielo.php?pid=S0716-078X2006000100002&script=sci_abstract&tlng=en. 
12. ^ Diana S. Jones (2003). "The biogeography of Western Australian shallow-water barnacles". In F. E. Wells, D. I. Walker and D. S. Jones. The Marine Flora and Fauna of Dampier, Western Australia. Western Australian Museum, Perth. pp. 479–496. ISBN 978-1-920843-07-6. http://www.museum.wa.gov.au/DAMPIER/documents/pdf/di%20jones.pdf. 
13. ^ P. J. Hayward, M. J. Isaac, P. Makings, J. Moyse, E. Naylor & G. Smaldon (1995). "Crustaceans". In P. J. Hayward & John Stanley Ryland. Handbook of the Marine Fauna of North-west Europe. Oxford University Press. pp. 289–461. ISBN 9780198540557. http://books.google.com/books?id=sZ8mdRT4jbIC&pg=PA307. 
14. ^ M. Sciberras & P. J. Schembri (2007). "A critical review of records of alien marine species from the Maltese Islands and surrounding waters (Central Mediterranean)". Mediterranean Marine Science 8 (1): 41–66. http://www.medit-mar-sc.net/files/200812/15-1815266.pdf.