Diogenes karwarensis Nayak & Neelakantan, 1989

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 : 27

Diogenes karwarensis Nayak & Neelakantan, 1989

Persian Gulf. Iran (Moradmand 2007; Kazmi et al. 2007; present study).

Iran. Hormozgan Province: Qeshm I. (five stations around the island) . Khuzestan Province: Bandar-Emam Hassan.

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

Habitat. Rocky/cobble intertidal.

Remarks. Diogenes karwarensis is very closely related to its sympatric congener D. avarus . In the original description, Nayak & Neelakantan (1989) discriminated this species from the latter by some characters, which generally show variations within both species (McLaughlin & Dworschack 2001; Moradmand 2007). The two most discriminative characters stated by earlier studies (e.g. Nayak & Neelakantan 1989); Siddiqui et al. 2004) are the presence of a large distinct spine distally on the fourth segment of the antenna, and a row of the large spines along the anterior margin of the carpus of the first walking legs. The senior author has examined a huge amount of specimens of the both species, and could not find any reliable character discriminating these two species. Further taxonomic studies using morphometric and genetics studies are necessary in order to establish the taxonomic position of D. karwarensis .