Dysdera festai Caporiacco, 1929

Bellvert, Adrià, Dimitrov, Dragomir, Zamani, Alireza & Arnedo, Miquel A., 2024, Integrating museum collections and molecules reveals genus-level synonymy and new species in red devil spiders (Araneae, Dysderidae) from the Middle East and Central Asia, European Journal of Taxonomy 921 (210), pp. 210-235 : 228

Dysdera festai Caporiacco, 1929

Figs 26–33

Diagnosis

See Deeleman-Reinhold & Deeleman (1988).

Type material

Neotype

GREECE • 1 ♂; South Aegean: Rhodes, Petaloudes ; 15 Oct. 1984; P. R. Deeleman leg.; MZSUT.

Other material examined

GREECE • 1 ♂, 1 ♀, 5 juvs; South Aegean: Rhodes, Petaloudes ; 15 Oct. 1984; P. R. Deeleman leg.; MZSUT .

TURKEY • 1 ♂; Antalya Province, Antalya; 13 May 1969; NHMW .

Description

See Deeleman-Reinhold & Deeleman (1988).

Distribution

Known from Greece (Rhodes), and the new record in Turkey reported herein.

Remarks

The chelicerae of the male collected from Turkey are unmodified ( Fig. 26 ) while all the male specimens from the type locality bear a distinct projection at the middle part of the prolateral margin of the paturon ( Fig. 27 ). There are two possible explanations for this phenomenon: either it is due to trait polymorphism, or the population from mainland Anatolia belongs to a different species altogether. The presence of a tooth-like prolateral projection on the male chelicera has been reported in other, unrelated species of Dysdera such as Dysdera dentichelis Simon, 1882 from Lebanon or Dysdera mucronata Simon, 1911 from Morocco, and in those species it is considered a diagnostic trait. However, because of the identical male palps ( Figs 28–30 vs 31–33) and the small sampling size (single male), here we tentatively assign the Turkish specimen to D. festai , pending more thorough analyses.

Figures

Figs 26–33. Male Dysdera festai Caporiacco, 1929 (26, 28–30 = specimen from Turkey (NHMW); 27, 31–33 = specimen from Greece (MZSUT)). 26–27. Cephalic region. 28–33. Left palp. 28, 31. Prolateral view. 29, 32. Anterior view. 30, 33. Retrolateral view. Scale bars: 26–27 = 2 mm; 28–33 = 0.5 mm.