Austinogebia narutensis ( Sakai, 1986 )

Osawa, Masayuki & Ota, Yuzo, 2020, New Records of Species of Gebiidea and Anomura (Crustacea: Decapoda) from the Sea of Japan, Species Diversity 25, pp. 295-307 : 296

Austinogebia narutensis ( Sakai, 1986) ( Fig. 2A–D )

Upogebia major (non De Haan, 1841): Miyake 1982: pl. 31, fig. 5.

Upogebia spinifrons non Haswell, 1881: Sakai 1984: 209, figs 1–3.

Upogebia narutensis Sakai, 1986: 25 , pl. 1 (type locality: Ohge-Jima, Naruro, Tokushima Prefecture, Japan; low intertidal); Ngoc-Ho 1994: 198, figs 4, 5 (in part); Sakai 2006: 130.

Austinogebia narutensis : Ngoc-Ho 2001: 50, fig. 3; Sato et al. 2016: 36, fig. 5A.

Material examined. Tottori Prefecture. Off Sakaiminato (35°52′N, 133°31′E), 16 October 2006, coll . M . Nagata, 1 male (cl 17.9 mm), 3 females (cl 16.7–18.9 mm), TRPM-780.

Distribution. Japan and Taiwan; lower intertidal to depths of 5–30 m ( Sakai 2006, as Upogebia narutensis ). Japanese records include Ibaraki, Shizuoka, Wakayama, Hiroshima, Tottori, Yamaguchi (Honshu mainland), Tokushima, Kochi (Shikoku mainland), and Kagoshima (Kyushu mainland) Prefectures ( Itani 2004; Sakai 2006; Sato et al. 2016; present study). The present specimens reveal the first record of this species from the Sea of Japan.

Habitat. Seashore, sand or muddy sand ( Itani 2004). In the Seto Inland Sea, Austinogebia narutensis is sympatric with Upogebia issaeffi (Balss, 1913) on sandy shores and with U. major (De Haan, 1841) on a muddy shore ( Itani 2004); whereas in Kashima-nada, Ibaraki Prefecture, A. narutensis inhabits subtidal fine-sand bottom in open coast ( Sato et al. 2016). The structure of burrows of A. narutensis was studied in detail by Kinoshita and Itani (2005).

Remarks. The genus Austinogebia Ngoc-Ho, 2001 now includes eight species (cf. Liu and Sha 2015) and among them, only A. narutensis and A. wuhsienweni (Yu, 1931) have been recorded from Japanese waters ( Sakai 2006). Austinogebia narutensis is characterized by the rostrum being 1.2–1.5 times as long as broad at the base, the anterior half of the rostrum being unarmed dorsally, the third article of the antennal peduncle with a distal spine on the lower margin, and the merus of the second pereopod with a distal spine on the upper margin ( Ngoc-Ho 2001). This species has been recorded from the southwestern coast of Kyushu (Izumi, Kagoshima Prefecture; Sakai 2006). The present record of A. narutensis in the Sea of Japan suggests that the species is also distributed in the northwestern coast of Kyushu, although no records of the species from the area are available so far

Figures

Fig. 2. Preserved specimens. A, Austinogebia narutensis (Sakai, 1986), female (cl 18.9mm), TRPM-780, left lateral view; B, same, carapace, dorsal view; C, same, left lateral view, anterior part of body, showing pereopod 1; D, Austinogebia narutensis (Sakai, 1986), male (cl 17.9mm), TRPM-780, left lateral view; E, Paguristes gonagrus (H. Milne Edwards, 1836), male (sl 6.4mm), TRPM-782, dorsal view; F, Paguristes versus Komai, 2001, male (sl 5.8mm), TRPM-783, dorsal view; G, Nematopagurus australis (Henderson, 1888), female (sl 4.3mm), TRPM-784, dorsal view; H, Galathea guttata Osawa, 2004, male (pcl 3.1mm), TRPM-785, dorsal view; I, Munida agave Macpherson and Baba, 1993, ovigerous female (pcl 7.4mm), TRPM-788, dorsal view.