Platymaia turbynei Stebbing, 1902

Muñoz, Isabel, García-Isarch, Eva & Cuesta, Jose A., 2021, Annotated and updated checklist of marine crabs (Decapoda: Brachyura) of Mozambique supported by morphological and molecular data from shelf and slope species of the “ MOZAMBIQUE ” surveys, Zootaxa 5056 (1), pp. 1-67 : 35-36

Platymaia turbynei Stebbing, 1902

( Figure 13A )

Material examined. M07, Stn. 4, 620m, ♂ 38.8× 48.4mm (IEO-CD-MZ07/1924); M08, Stn. 22, 618m, ♂ juvenile 8.3× 8.7mm (IEO-CD-MZ08/1780-1), COI ( MZ 434799 ); ♂ juvenile 8.9× 8.1mm (IEO-CD-MZ08/1780-2), COI ( MZ 434800 ) ; 9.3× 9.1mm (IEO-CD-MZ08/1780-3) 16S ( MZ 424955 ), COI ( MZ 434801 ); M09, Stn. 19, 542m, ♂ 24.2× 39.8mm (IEO-CD-MZ09/1854-1); M09, Stn. 92, 619m, ♂ 25.3× 42mm (IEO-CD-MZ09/1795) .

Habitat and distribution. Platymaia turbynei is distributed along the east coast of South Africa, from Natal to southern Mozambique Channel, Madagascar, and Reunion Island (Griffin & Tranter 1986), between 200 and 880m (according to Kensley 1981) or 996m (according to Emmerson 2016c) in Mozambican waters.

Results and remarks. The six specimens were collected between March and April of M07, M08 and M09, at depths of 542–620m. Their morphological characters are in agreement with the descriptions included in the revision of some majoid crabs of IWP made by Griffin & Tranter (1986).

Colouration observed. Fresh specimens showed reddish carapace and salmon-colour legs. The spines are darker.

DNA barcodes. As already commented above for the 16S sequence of P. alcocki , there are not 16S sequences available for this species on any public database. There is only a short (400 bp) and incomplete 16S sequence of Platymaia remifera , deposited in Genbank by Tsang et al. (2014). Therefore, it is not possible a real comparison without the complete sequence, but the 15 mutations found in the 400 bp suggest a distance that fits well at intrageneric level. When comparing with the 16S sequence of P. alcocki , the similarity found of 91% could be considered in the limit between intra or intergeneric distance. This distance increased when comparing the COI sequences, with a similarity of 83%, that also supports a divergence at intergeneric level. There is a COI sequence ( MDECA 062-10) in BOLD that corresponds to one specimen identified by Chan as Platymaia sp. which was collected in Mozambique by the MB-exp in 2009 (date collection: 2009-04-09) and deposited at the MNHN ( MNHN _IU200810370). This COI sequence fits 99.67 and 99.02% (one and seven mutations, respectively) with the two COI haplotypes obtained for P. turbynei , and for this reason it must be attributed to this species.

Figures

FIGURE 13. A, Platymaia turbynei, ♂ IEO-CD-MZ07/1924; B, Paramaja gibba, ♀ IEO-CD-MZ08/1820; C, Sakaija africana ♀ IEO-CD-MZ08/1784; D, Pleistacantha ori, ♀ IEO-CD-MZ08/12545; E, Parathranites ori, ♀ IEO-CD-MZ08/1767; F, Paratranites granosus, ♀ IEO-CD-Mz08/1785; G, Parathranites orientalis, ♀ IEO-CD-MZ07/1909 (preserved). Scale bars: 1cm.