Cancer nepotei Curtiss, 1938

Ng, Peter K. L., Eldredge, Lucius G. & Evenhuis, Neal L., 2011, The names of decapod and stomatopod Crustacea from Tahiti, French Polynesia, established by Anthony Curtiss in 1938 and 1944, Zootaxa 3099, pp. 43-56 : 52

Cancer nepotei Curtiss, 1938

Cancer maculatus Linnaeus, 1758: 626 .

Cancer nepotei Curtiss, 1938: 176 , n. syn.

Curtiss (1938: 176) stated: “This pale purplish sea-crab [ Cancer nepotei ] is much like the last [ Cancer samuelis ]”. His account of C. nepotei is detailed and the colour description “The body is pale purplish brown, with eleven or twelve dark, dull spots of reddish brown. The spots are: one on each side, beside the eye; one on each side on the front edge of the upper shell, outside the two just spoken of; three in the middle of the back; one small spot behind these three (this small spot was missing in one example I saw); and four on the hinder part of the back, in front of the folded-under tail. The two outer spots on the front of the shell have a yellowish area around them. The underside of the body, and the front of the pincers, are yellow. The legs are pale purplish brown (like the back) on their upper side, and yellow underneath; towards the tips they become entirely yellow, and the very tips are dull black. The eyes have yellow stalks and dark ends” ( Curtiss 1938: 176) leaves no doubt that this species is Carpilius maculatus ( Linnaeus, 1758) (Carpiliidae) . By elimination, this can only mean that Cancer samuelis is Carpilius convexus ( Forskål, 1775) as there are only two known congeners from the Indo-West Pacific.