Glomeridesmus Gervais, 1844

Wesener, Thomas, Wongthamwanich, Nattarin & Moritz, Leif, 2021, Description of the first species of Glomeridesmida from Thailand (Diplopoda, Glomeridesmida, Glomeridesmidae), ZooKeys 1024, pp. 137-156 : 137

Genus Glomeridesmus Gervais, 1844

Glomeridesmus Gervais, 1844a: xxvii. Gervais 1844 b: 61; 1847: 86; 1859: 2. Latzel 1884: 59, 124. Pocock 1894a: 332; 1894b: 476. Silvestri 1896: 201; 1898: 645; 1902: 183; 1903: 22. Brölemann 1898: 256. Attems 1928: 209. Verhoeff 1929: 1377. Loomis 1936: 9; 1964: 9; 1968: 7; 1975: 168. Carl 1941: 250; 1942: 134-167. Jeekel 1971: 33; 2003: 103. Shear 1974: 245. Hoffman 1980: 60; 1999: 19. Shelley 2011: 2. Iniesta et al. 2012: 29. Mauriès 1980: 1060; 2020: 51.

Zephroniodesmus Pocock, 1894b: 476. Silvestri 1896: 201; 1898: 645. Attems 1926: 116. Verhoeff 1929: 1377. Loomis 1936: 9. Carl 1942: 165. Jeekel 1971: 33. Synonymized by Loomis (1936).

Javadesmus Verhoeff, 1929: 1377. Carl 1942: 150, 165. Jeekel 1971: 33. Synonymized by Carl (1942)

Type species.

Glomeridesmus porcellus Gervais & Goudot, 1844 ( Colombia)

Javadesmus : Glomeridesmus javanicus Attems, 1907 ( Indonesia: Java)

Zephroniodesmus : Glomeridesmus sumatranus Pocock, 1894 ( Indonesia: Sumatra).

Species included.

30, including the species described below ( Jeekel 2003; Iniesta et al. 2012; Mauriès 2020).

Distribution.

Central America and northern half of South America and the Caribbean (26); India (1); Indonesia (2); Thailand (1 described below). Unidentified specimens from various localities in SE Asia and Oceania ( Shelley 2011).

Comment.

The position of the new species in the genus Glomeridesmus is tentative at best. As two genus names ( Zephroniodesmus , Javadesmus ) synonymized with Glomeridesmus ( Loomis 1936, Carl 1942) are available for SE Asian Glomeridesmidae and were based on female specimens, both require redescriptions based on topotypic male material. Therefore, we hesitate to introduce a third genus name, which might later turn out to be synonymous. The species from Thailand described here differs significantly from the known Indian and American species at least in the telopod morphology, and potentially in other previously undocumented morphological characters.