Paraschizidium, Verhoeff, 1918

Reboleira, Ana Sofia P. S., Gonçalves, Fernando, Oromí, Pedro & Taiti, Stefano, 2015, The cavernicolous Oniscidea (Crustacea: Isopoda) of Portugal, European Journal of Taxonomy 161, pp. 1-61 : 50

Paraschizidium sp.

Fig. 32 A–E

Material examined

PORTUGAL: 4 ♀♀, Algar do Javali, Montejunto Massif, 19 Sep. 2009 ( MZUF); 6 ♀♀, same locality, 24 Dec. 2009 (SR).

Remarks

At present, the genus Paraschizidium includes with certainty only three species: P. coeculum (Silvestri, 1897) , distributed from Spain to the Balkans, P. hispanum Arcangeli, 1935 from southern Spain, and P. roubali Frankenberger, 1940 from Prague, Czech Republic ( Frankenberger 1940), which is probably a junior synonym of P. coeculum (see Manicastri & Taiti 1994). Other species from Greece originally included in the genus Paraschizidium by Schmalfuss (1981) and Sfenthourakis (1992, 1995) were transferred to the genus Schizidium Verhoeff, 1901 by Schmalfuss (2008). Our specimens certainly belong to the genus Paraschizidium : they are depigmented and blind, have no schisma at the posterolateral corner of the pereonite 1 ( Fig. 32A ), the cephalon has oblique antennal lobes ( Fig. 32 B–C), the telson is short and triangular ( Fig. 32D ) and the antennula has two articles ( Fig. 32E ). Unfortunately, the absence of males in our material does not permit the identification of these specimens to species level.

Figures

Fig. 32. Paraschizidium sp. from Algar do Javali, Montejunto, ♀. A. Specimen in lateral view. B. Cephalon in frontal view. C. Cephalon in dorsal view. D. Pleonite 5, telson and uropods. E. Antennula.