Two groups of parasites on the body of copepods

Many types of parasites were detected on the body of different copeopodsin the samples collected from different locations of Kuwaiti waters especially after the Gulf war crisis and the eventual spillage of oil. The occurrence of these parasites was not limited to a specific area only. The two groups of parasites were found infecting the body of copepods. The first group is called Ellobiopsis chattoni and the second group is called Thalassomyces sp. which were found infecting many copepods namely Paracalanus aculeatus, Paracalanus crassirostris, Acartia danae,Temora discaudata . The infected organisms were found in reduced size, hence the biomass of plankton was also found less than that of the non infected copepods but the overall biodiversity of marine organisms were not found affected during the infection period.