Willowsia, Shoebotham, 1917

Cipola, Nikolas Gioia, Katz, Aron D., Bu, Yun & Godeiro, Nerivania Nunes, 2025, Systematics of Willowsia jacobsoni (Börner, 1913) (Collembola, Entomobryidae): morphology, postembryonic development, distribution, mitogenome and phylogeny, Zootaxa 5604 (3), pp. 201-233 : 223

On Willowsia distribution

Willowsia jacobsoni has several records from the Eastern region of the Old World, but it had never been recorded from China mainland ( Fig. 8 ). Due to the main distribution of the genus and the species in the Old World, especially in Asia, we believe that W. jacobsoni was possibly introduced in the Americas (including Caribbean and Hawaiian Islands), given its ability to occupy different natural and even anthropic habitats ( Christiansen & Bellinger 1994: 316). This is the case of Brazilian populations herein reported, which was found in urban areas found in urban areas, representing the first record of the species and the genus in Brazil ( Zeppelini et al. 2025). We believe that W. jacobsoni was probably also introduced into Africa, since no endemic species of Willowsia has been described for the continent to date ( Bellinger et al. 1996 –2024). In the Americas, although there are other species widely distributed (e.g. W. buski , W. nigromaculata ), the genus has only three species restricted to North America ( W. mexicana , W. neonigromaculata and W. pyrrhopygia ). The distribution data suggest that Asia is most likely the origin center of Willowsia , since this region concentrates the greatest richness of the genus, with 37 species (84% of the total).

Figures

FIGURE 8. Records of W. jacobsoni, star represents the type locality, red symbols previous records, and green symbols new records.