Dendrolycosa Doleschall 1859

Dendrolycosa Doleschall 1859: 51 (description of the genus).

Therimachus Thorell 1895: 224 (description of the genus). Simon 1898a: 294 (synonymy with Dendrolycosa). Campostichommides Strand 1911: 164 (description of the genus). syn. nov.

Dianpisaura Zhang, Zhu & Song 2004: 366 (description of the genus). syn. nov.

The genus Dendrolycosa Doleschall 1859 was described from two subadult females from Ambon. The history of descriptions and transfers shows that the concept of this genus and other genera involved were never clear and misunderstood in several cases. Blandin (1979) revised African representatives and included Dendrolycosa as well. Unfortunately, he did not illustrate the subadult female syntypes of D. fusca from Ambon, but instead a female identified by Eugene Simon from MNHN from Java, wrongly assigned to the type species (see D. duckitti spec. nov. below). After the description of the type species, four species have been subsequently described from Southeast Asia, one from East Africa and one from Australia. Four of them have been described in other genera and later transferred to Dendrolycosa (Blandin 1979, Davies 1982). Five species originally described in Dendrolycosa were transferred to the genus Hygropoda Thorell 1894: H. albolimbata (Thorell 1878), H. dolomedes (Thorell 1878), H. exilis (Thorell 1881), and H. longitarsis (Thorell 1877) by Roewer (1955b: 1458) as well as H. lineata (Thorell 1881) by Davies (1985), one species was transferred to the genus Voraptus Simon 1898 (Zoridae): V. tenellus (Simon 1893) by Roewer (1955b: 1458). Another species was considered a nomen nudum (Platnick 2011): “ D. kochi Simon 1898 ”: 289 (female from E Australia, which was illustrated by Blandin 1979: 365, fig. 34; Rainbow [1911: 262] stated that Simon informed him in a “letter dated Paris, 6th July, 1910, ... he has not yet described this species, but that he included it in his work under manuscript name in order to define the range of the genus“).

Strand (1911) descriped the monotypic genus Campostichommides in the Agelenidae . Lehtinen (1967) transferred the genus to the Pisauridae . It is recognised as junior synonym of Dendrolycosa (see note in D. inquirenda).

Zhang et al. (2004) later erected the genus Dianpisaura Zhang, Zhu & Song 2004 for two Chinese species previously described in the genus Pisaura Simon 1885: D. lizhii (Zhang 2000) (type species) and D. songi (Zhang 2000) . Both species were described by Zhang (2000) from southern Yunnan Province less than 100 km from the border to Laos. Both species were recognised to be congeneric with Dendrolycosa fusca . While comparing more nominal Pisaura species, some of them that had been described from the Philippines and from India were identified as belonging to this genus. Moreover, Nilus ornatus Berland 1924 is transferred to the genus Dendrolycosa .

Extended diagnosis. Small to large (6–21 mm) sized Pisaurinae. Diagnostic characters of females are the wide intromittent ducts, in contrast to Pisaura spp., and the presence of one or two depressions in the anterior epigyne (Zhang et al. 2004, for Dianpisaura). The only diagnostic character for male copulatory organs spiders is the absence of an embolar membrane that, in contrast, is present in Pisaura species (Zhang et al. 2004: sub Dianpisaura). According to observations in Laos, the web-building behaviour of Dendrolycosa species may also serve as a diagnostic character: a sheet web with a funnel retreat that is built in vegetation, which is similar to the webs of Agelena spp., although not as large.

Note. The length of the palpal tibia is not here considered diagnostic on a generic level, as proposed in the description of Dianpisaura (Zhang et al. 2004) . It seems to be an exceptional character state in D. robusta . In all other males of the genus, the male palpal tibia is as long as or shorter than the cymbium. Zhang et al. (2004) proposed the anterior patch of the dorsal opisthosoma embedded in a dark folium with undulating margins, especially in posterior half, as a diagnostic character (here called pattern A, combined with two white submarginal bands on the dorsal prosoma). This pattern is known to be present in D. bairdi spec. nov., D. bobbiliensis comb. nov., D. fusca, D. icadia, D. inquirenda comb. nov., D. lepida, D. ornata comb. nov., D. parangbusta comb. nov., D. robusta, D. sierwaldae spec. nov., and D. songi comb. nov. The colour pattern of the opisthosomata in D. duckitti spec. nov., D. gitae comb. nov., D. yuka spec. nov. and D. putiana comb. nov. is different: it consists of three prosomal and four opisthosomal thin longitudinal bright lines with a distinct incision of the lateral lines in the posterior half (pattern B). Moreover, D. duckitti spec. nov. is an olive green colour in live specimens whereas species with pattern A are brown or reddish brown. In D. cruciata, a third pattern could exist: dark chevrons on dorsal opisthosoma (Fig. 33), but from the type material it is not clear whether this pattern was real or whether artefacts have been illustrated by Roewer (ridges caused by shrivelling?). No closer relationships could be recognised between species within one pattern. It is interpreted as colour variation as is known intraspecifically from Megadolomedes australianus (L. Koch 1865), which was described and illustrated by Davies and Raven (1980: figs 8–12). Another spider genus with similarly two distinct colour patterns is Alopecosa Simon 1885 (Lycosidae) (Nentwig et al. 2010).

In the present species distal tibiae and metatarsi are darkened.

Composition. D. bairdi spec. nov. from Laos, D. bobbiliensis (Reddy & Patel 1993) comb. nov. from India, D. cruciata (Roewer 1955) from East Africa, D. duckitti spec. nov. from Laos, D. fusca Doleschall 1859 (type species) from Amboina, D. gitae (Tikader 1970) comb. nov. from India, D. icadia (L. Koch 1876) from Queensland, Australia, D. lepida (Thorell 1890) from Sumatra, D. ornata (Berland 1924) comb. nov. from New Caledonia, D. parangbusta (Barrion & Litsinger 1995) comb. nov. from Philippines, D. putiana (Barrion & Litsinger 1995) comb. nov. from Philippines, D. robusta (Thorell 1895) from Burma, D. sierwaldae spec. nov. from New Guinea, D. songi (Zhang 2000) comb. nov. from Yunnan, China, D. yuka spec. nov. from Australia. Additionally, five undescribed species are known from Australia (Raven, in litt.). According to the diversity known it is likely that more species exist.

Nomina dubia: D. inquirenda (Strand 1911) comb. nov. from Indonesia (Moluccas), D. spadicaria (Simon 1897) from India, D. stauntoni Pocock 1900 from India.

Nomina nuda: “ Dendrolycosa kochi Simon 1898 ” (see D. yuka spec. nov.)

Distribution. Tanzania, India, Burma, China ( Yunnan Province), Laos (Oudomxai Province, Vientiane Province, Bolikhamsay Province, Champasak Province), Indonesia (Sumatra, Java, Ambon, Moluccas), New Guinea, Australia (Queensland), New Caledonia