A survey of the Porrhoclubiona Lohmander, 1944 from Central Asia (Araneae, Clubiondae)

Abstract

Clubiona Latreille, 1804, with more than 500 named species, is one of the largest genera of Araneae. The genus has 15 synonyms, most of which are not listed in the World Spider Catalog (2018) and unknown to many arachnologists. The most comprehensive survey of Clubiona sensu lato by Wunderlich (2011) also lacked a few synonyms. In this paper all genus group names described in Clubiona are listed with their type species. Most of these names correspond to the species groups recognised in Clubiona sensu lato. We agree that Porrhoclubiona Lohmander, 1944 (= Clubionagenevensis-group) deserves a status of a separate genus and provide the diagnosis of this taxon. Three species of Porrhoclubiona that occur in Central Asia are surveyed, and two of them are described as new to science: P.laudata (O. Pickard-Cambridge, 1885), comb. n. (♂♀, Xinjiang, Tibet, China), P.bosmansisp. n. (♂♀, Tajikistan), and P.moradmandisp. n. (♂♀, Fars, Iran). It seems that all records of P.genevensis L. Koch, 1866 from China refer to P.laudata. The records of Clubionavegeta Simon, 1918 from Tajikistan and Iran refer to P.bosmansi sp. n. and P.moradmandi sp. n., respectively. The following new combinations have been established: Porrhoclubionadecora (Blackwall, 1859), comb. n., P.diniensis (Simon, 1878), comb. n., P.leucaspis (Simon, 1932), comb. n., P.minor (Wunderlich, 1987), comb. n., P.pseudominor (Wunderlich, 1987), comb. n., P.pteronetoides (Deeleman-Reinhold, 2001), comb. n., P.vegeta (Simon, 1918), comb. n., P.viridula (Ono, 1989), comb. n., and P.wunderlichi (Mikhailov 1992), comb. n. (all ex. Clubiona). SEM study of the structure considered earlier as scopula in Clubiona and Porrhoclubiona reveals that it is represented by several lateral rows of movable macrosetae (spines) with a locking mechanism.

Figure 58 from: Zhang J, Yu H, Li S (2021) Taxonomic studies on the sac spider genus Clubiona (Araneae, Clubionidae) from Xishuangbanna Rainforest, China. In: Li S (Ed.) Spiders of Xishuangbanna, China. ZooKeys 1034: 1-163. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.1034.59413

“…According to the quite diverse copulatory structures of both sexes, Clubiona sensu lato has been widely regarded as paraphyletic and will likely be split in the future (Wunderlich 2011;Marusik and Omelko 2018;. However, we agree with Mikhailov (2012) regarding the need of an extensive, large-scale review of the genus.…”

“…Comments. Clubiona sensu lato currently contains more than 500 nominal species and is one of the largest genera of Araneae (Marusik and Omelko 2018;WSC 2021).…”

How Not to Conduct a Scientific Debate: A Counterpoint to the Recent Critique of the “Pragmatic Classification” of Jumping Spiders (Arthropoda: Arachnida: Araneae: Salticidae)

“…str., it also implies a double standard, as the underlying analysis is also far from global in scale and lacks a cladistic analysis: most importantly, the authors did not examine the supposed Southeast-Asian members of the genus and their geographic neighbours. As a result, Porrhoclubiona sensu Marusik & Omelko (2018), i.e. combining the Palaearctic genevensis group (Bosmans et al 2017) and the Southeast-Asian pteronetoides group (Deeleman-Reinhold 2001), is very likely to be a polyphyletic assemblage.…”

“…The members of the pteronetoides group are not only zoogeographically unlikely relatives of the genevensis group, they also lack key synapomorphies of Porrhoclubiona as defined by Marusik & Omelko (2018). For instance, "[f]emales of Porrhoclubiona differ from these of Clubiona by the shape of receptacles: round sclerotised (or primary, Sr) and round hyaline (or secondary, Hr) receptacles (vs. both pairs of receptacles elongate)", but the members of the pteronetoides group have some of the most elongate receptacula of all Clubiona species.…”

Figure 12 from: Zhang J, Yu H, Li S (2021) Taxonomic studies on the sac spider genus Clubiona (Araneae, Clubionidae) from Xishuangbanna Rainforest, China. In: Li S (Ed.) Spiders of Xishuangbanna, China. ZooKeys 1034: 1-163. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.1034.59413

“…Clubiona Latreille, 1804 is the type genus of the Clubionidae Wagner, 1887 and currently includes 506 extant species that are found worldwide except for the Polar Regions and South America (WSC 2021). This genus comprises 61% of the total number of species of the family (Marusik and Omelko 2018;WSC 2021). Despite its high species diversity, the genus Clubiona remains inadequately studied: almost half of the species are known from a single sex or juveniles (82 from males only, 133 from females only, two from juveniles only), and in some cases, the adults are apparently mismatched, or conspecific males and females have been described as separate species (Deeleman-Reinhold 2001;Jäger and Dankittipakul 2010;WSC 2021); the descriptions from early studies are rather brief, many species are not illustrated, or illustrations are inadequate; types of some species do not exist or are difficult to locate or access.…”