This Catalog is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Gilberto Rodríguez (1929–2004), a distinguished Venezuelan carcinologist, pioneer in marine biology, and foundational figure in ecological research in Venezuela. Dr. Rodríguez made lasting contributions to the field, most notably as the founder of the Center for Ecology at the Venezuelan Institute for Scientific Research (IVIC) in Caracas in 1970, where he laid the groundwork for interdisciplinary ecological studies that have influenced generations of scientists. In his landmark publication, Los Crustáceos Decápodos de Venezuela (1980), Dr. Rodríguez addressed “the need of numerous Venezuelan limnologists and marine scientists for a manual devoted to the identification of the species of decapod Crustacea.” With this in mind, this work has been developed as a modern and substantially expanded update to Rodríguez’s original work. It is organized into six volumes, each featuring comprehensive species distribution maps based on data from the World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS) and the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF). The Catalog focuses primarily on the Tropical Northwestern Atlantic region, encompassing the coastal waters of Venezuela. For biogeographic completeness, it also includes the island chains stretching from the Bahamas to the Turks and Caicos Islands, with occasional extensions into adjacent marine areas where species ranges warrant inclusion.
