| Studies concerning marine mammal parasites are scarce and some are outdated. I document the metazoan parasites of cetaceans and sirenians from Puerto Rico, the U.S. and British Virgin Islands, and of cetacean and pinnipeds from California using both morphological and genetic identification. Forty cetaceans and manatees were salvaged in the Caribbean between 1992 and 2004 and 28 marine mammals were salvaged in California between 1974 and 2002. Parasitic specimens were collected after necropsy and fixed in 10% formalin or preserved in 70% ethanol. Parasites were mounted in lactophenol for morphological identification. Because of morphological similarities between nematode parasites, genetic identification was performed on 36 helminthes. For California, six species of nematodes, two cestodes, one acanthocephalan and one arthropod were found. For the Caribbean, eight species of nematodes, two cestodes, two acanthocephalans, and three species of nematodes were identified. These constitute two new host records for the west coast of North America. Seven new host records and five new geographic records were found for the Caribbean. |
