Philyra sagittifera Alcock, 1896

Naderloo, Reza & Türkay, Michael, 2012, Decapod crustaceans of the littoral and shallow sublittoral Iranian coast of the Persian Gulf: Faunistics, Biodiversity and Zoogeography 3374, Zootaxa 3374 (1), pp. 1-67 : 32

Philyra sagittifera Alcock, 1896

Persian Gulf. Saudi Arabia [ Basson et al. (1977) as Philyra rectangularis ; Apel, 2001], UAE ( Titgen 1982; Cooper 1997; Apel 2001), Iran [ Stephensen (1946) as Philyra rectangularis ; present study].

Iran. Hormozgan Province: Qeshm I., East of Bandar Abbas , Bandar-Khamir . Bushehr Province: Bushehr (Jofreh).

General distribution. Northwestern Indian Ocean: Persian Gulf, Pakistan.

Habitat. Sandy-muddy/muddy-sand flat.

Remarks. Philyra sagittifera was originally described as Ebalia sagittifera by Alcock (1896). Several regional studies (e.g. Titgen 1982; Cooper 1997; Apel 2001) have recorded this species as Ebalia sagittifera using its original name. However, here we refer to two recent publications ( Ng et al. 2008; Galil 2009) in assigning the species to the genus Philyra . Although, the species is more related to the genus Ebalia , in particular regarding the morphology of the carapace, rather than the genus Philyra . Two species P. sagittifera and P. concinnus are very closely related and must be assigned to the same genus, probably a new genus must be introduced for them (see Apel 2001). In her partly revision of the genus Philyra, Galil (2009) , listed 27 species including P. sagittifera and P. concinnus as in need to be revised and she could not assigned them to any of the seven new genera described by her.