Scolopendra morsitans Linnaeus, 1758

Examined material.

52 specimens: NHMUK 015991435, 33 juveniles; Casuarina litter, Picard, Aldabra, 18. 04. 1974, leg. V. W. Spaull ; NHMUK 015991436, 1 specimen, Casuarina, Picard, Aldabra, 04. 02. 1974 ; NHMUK 015991437, 1 specimen, Ochna soil, Picard, Aldabra, 15. 02. 1974 ; NHMUK 015991438; 2 specimens, mixed scrub, Picard, 24. 12. 1974 ; NHMUK 015991439, 1 specimen, Thespesia litter, Cinq Cases, Aldabra, 15. 11. 1973 ; NHMUK 015991441, 5 specimens, Black Path, Picard, 1975 ; NHMUK 015991442, 1 specimen, Picard, 03. 12. 1973 ; NHMUK 015991443, 1 specimen, Picard, 18. 01. 1974 ; NHMUK 015991440, 4 specimens, Picard, 18. 11. 1974 ; NHMUK 015991444, 1 specimen, Pitfall trap 5, 08. 12. 1974 ; NHMUK 015991447, 1 specimen, South Island, Aldabra, 13–20.03. 1968, leg. B. Cogan & A. Hutson ; NHMUK 015991448, 1 specimen, Ile. Michel, 02.1968, leg. B. Cogan & A. Hutson .

Remarks.

Specimens of S. morsitans Linnaeus, 1758 collected from mainland Africa, originally identified as Scolopendra amazonica Bücherl, 1946 overlap with the specimens from the Aldabra Atoll in several characters (Table 2) (Lewis 1966, 1967, 1968, 1969), but generally have a greater number of glabrous basal antennal articles, a character in which specimens from the Aldabra Atoll more closely match Indian specimens of S. morsitans previously assigned to S. amazonica (Jangi 1955, 1959). In the absence of newly collected material from which molecular data can be collected to evaluate possible interspecific delimitation between different population of S. morsitans, we assign material collected in the Aldabra Atoll to S. morsitans, following the conclusions on interspecific variation within this taxon reached by Würmli (1975). Subsequent phylogenetic analyses of molecular data for S. morsitans identified multiple lineages within this taxon (Joshi and Karanth 2011; Siriwut et al. 2016), potentially indicating the existence of a cryptic species complex as suggested by recent taxonomic review (Lewis 2010 a). Until the global taxonomy of S. morsitans is interrogated using molecular data to establish if this is the case, we classify the examined material as S. morsitans .

Additionally, specimens were compared to the original description of the morphologically similar and geographically proximate Scolopendra antananarivoensis Kronmüller, 2010 . Material from the Aldabra Atoll did not exhibit the characters given as diagnostic for S. antananarivoensis, lacking a longitudinal median depression on sternite 21 and not having a distinctly more elongate coxopleural process (Kronmüller 2010).