BACKGROUND: Lake Tana is the largest lake in Ethiopia and the source of the Blue Nile. The lake harbours unique endemic cyprinid fish species, as well as the commercially important endemic Nile tilapia subspecies Oreochromis niloticus tana and the North African catfish Clarias gariepinus. Its endemicity, especially within the Labeobarbus radiation, its conservation importance and its economic indispensability attract scientific interest to the lake's ichthyofauna. Fish parasites of Lake Tana, however, are hitherto poorly known, and no formal report exists on its monogenean flatworms. For sustainable aquaculture and fisheries development, it is essential to study monogenean fish parasites in these economically most important fish species. Moreover, it remains to be verified whether this unique ecosystem and its endemicity gave rise to a distinct parasite fauna as well. RESULTS: Nile tilapia and North African catfish hosts were collected from Lake Tana in 2013. Nine species of monogenean parasites of two orders, Gyrodactylidea Bychowsky, 1937 and Dactylogyridea Bychowsky, 1937, were recovered. Gyrodactylus gelnari Přikrylová, Blažek & Vanhove, 2012, Macrogyrodactylus clarii Gussev, 1961, Quadriacanthus aegypticus El-Naggar & Serag, 1986 and two undescribed Quadriacanthus species were recovered from C. gariepinus. Oreochromis niloticus tana hosted Cichlidogyrus cirratus Paperna, 1964, C. halli (Price & Kirk, 1967), C. thurstonae Ergens, 1981 and Scutogyrus longicornis (Paperna & Thurston, 1969). CONCLUSIONS: Except for M. clarii, all species represent new records for Ethiopia. This first study on the monogenean fauna of Lake Tana revealed that the lake's North African catfish, as well as its endemic Nile tilapia subspecies, harbour parasites that are known from these host species elsewhere in Africa.

Biology Department Royal Museum for Central Africa Leuvensesteenweg 13 3080 Tervuren Belgium

Department of Biology College of Natural and Computational Sciences Debre Markos University P O Box 269 Debre Markos Ethiopia

Department of Botany and Zoology Faculty of Science Masaryk University Kotlářská 2 611 37 Brno Czech Republic

Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences Stream Department of Zoological Sciences Addis Ababa University P O Box 1176 Addis Ababa Ethiopia

Institute of Marine Biological Resources and Inland Waters Hellenic Centre for Marine Research 46 7 km Athens Sounio Avenue PO Box 712 Anavyssos 190 13 Greece

Laboratory of Biodiversity and Evolutionary Genomics Department of Biology University of Leuven Charles Debériotstraat 32 3000 Leuven Belgium

Present address Capacities for Biodiversity and Sustainable Development Operational Directorate Natural Environment Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences Vautierstraat 29 1000 Brussels Belgium

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