CONFIRMAÇÃO DA OCORRÊNCIA DA Panulirus laevicauda (LATREILLE, 1817) NO GRANDE SISTEMA DE RECIFES DA AMAZÔNIA, AMAPÁ, BRASIL

The spiny lobsters of the genus Panulirus White, 1847 are widely exploited and commercialized in northern and northeastern Brazilian coastal regions. One of the species, the smoothtail spiny lobster Panulirus laevicauda (Latreille, 1817) had its distribution demarcated from Amapá to Santa Catarina State, but it was dubiously recorded in northern coast from industrial fishing samples, without collected material or photographs for taxonomic identification. Based on this, we report the occurrence of P. laevicauda in the northern region of Brazil (Amapá State) through material collected. The male specimen was collected on November 07th, 2022, at the depth of 84.5m, during commercial fishery operations of the red snapper Lutjanus purpureus (Poey, 1866), at the area of the Great Amazon Reef System (GARS) (04°45’29.849”N; 050°39’41.567”W). The current record confirms the occurrence of the species in Northern Brazil and it is the first report for the GARS.