Range Description

This species is native to the Caribbean, eastern Costa Rica, Panama, Guyana, Corrientes, Patagonia, Buenos Aires provinces in Argentina, Venezuela and eastern Brazil (although presence is uncertain in these last two locations) (Capitulo et al. 2001, NatureServe 2009). In the Caribbean, it is recorded from the Greater Antilles (Jamaica, Haiti, Domincan Republic and Puerto Rico); the Virgin Islands (St Thomas, Tortola and St. Croix); the Lesser Antilles (St. Martin, St Kitts, Nevis, Antigua, Guadeloupe, Marie Galante, Martinique, St.Lucia, St. Vincent, Barbados, Grenada and Trinidad); and Aruba and Isla Providencia in the Western Caribbean (Taylor 2003).

This species has also been introduced widely outside its native range: to the U.S. (Texas) and Canada (Keller et al. 2007, Palomares and Pauly 2009), although it is thought to have failed to establish in Texas (Karateyev et al. 2009); to Israel (Roll et al. 2009); and throughout west Africa (where it was introduced pre-1990), including Cote d'Ivoire (in the La Me and Agneby basins), Benin, Togo, Ghana and Nigeria (Bony et al. 2008).

Taylor (2003, 2004) thinks that specimens from Argentina may belong to a different species. Further work is needed to resolve this uncertainty in distribution.