Dolabrifera nicaraguana Pilsbry, 1896a

Cunha, Carlo M. & Rosenberg, Gary, 2019, Type specimens of Aplysiida (Gastropoda, Heterobranchia) in the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, with taxonomic remarks, Zoosystematics and Evolution 95 (2), pp. 361-372 : 361

Dolabrifera nicaraguana Pilsbry, 1896a Figure 3 A–E

Dolabrifera nicaraguana Pilsbry, 1896a: 124-125; 1896b pl. 63, figs 12-16.

Type locality.

San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua.

Type material.

Syntypes (all leg. J. E. Bransford): ANSP A7048, 2 specimens (both dry, one ca 25.5 mm long preserved with shell 7.8 mm long and another ca 24.6 mm long preserved, shell removed); ANSP 67517 (Pilsbry, 1896b: figs 12-14; Valdés et al 2017: fig. 15A, B), 1 shell (9.2 mm long), taken from body in A7048; ANSP 67518 ( Pilsbry 1896b: fig. 15), 1 shell (8.2 mm long), corresponding alcohol specimen missing.

Remarks.

Pilsbry (1896a) gave measurements for two specimens preserved in ethanol, but three shells and two bodies are present in the ANSP collection. The ANSP ledger lists 63517 from "San Juan Del Sur Nicaragua" (the type locality) as containing two alcohol specimens and one dry and 63518 from “Nicaragua” as having one alcohol and one dry. These were catalogued on 21 January 1896 and so are part of the material that Pilsbry examined as the description was published on 13 March 1896. The ledger lists 63517 as “Types” but does not list 63518 as a “type”. The original ANSP label for 63517 says "Shell of the TYPE"; whereas that for 63518 does not mention type status. Although Pilsbry intended 63517 to be the holotype, he did not designate a holotype in the original description, so we consider all of the material to be syntypes.

ANSP A7048 contains a note saying, "August 1969 badly dried" and the back of the most recent Academy label says "Treated with Tri-sodium phosphate and stepped up to 70% ETOH. Unfortunately, the sample subsequently dried out again, and so has been combined with the dry lot.

Current systematic position.

Dolabrifera nicaraguana Pilsbry, 1896 (fide Valdés et al. 2017).