Species Ammothea australiensis Flynn, 1919

Museums

Regional Maps

• Ammothea australiensis Flynn, T.T. 1919. Two new Australian Pycnogonida. Papers and Proceedings of the Royal Society of Tasmania 1918: 91-100 [95].

  Type data:

   Holotype AM, Shark Island, NSW [33° 51' 0" S, 151° 15' 0" E].

Distribution

States

New South Wales, South Australia, Tasmania, Western Australia

IBRA and IMCRA regions

IMCRA

Central Western Shelf Province (29), Southwest Shelf Transition (30), Southwest Shelf Province (31), Spencer Gulf Shelf Province (33), Western Bass Strait Shelf Transition (34), Bass Strait Shelf Province (35), Tasmanian Shelf Province (36), Southeast Shelf Transition (37), Central Eastern Shelf Province (38)

Ecological Descriptors

Adults: low intertidal, predator, subtidal.

Diagnosis

1.6 mm trunk length, dorsal tunercles high, pointed; spines on lateral processes and first coxae; proboscis inflated, distal palp segments small, subequal, auxliaries longer than half main claw; 11 denticulate spines on strigilis

ID Keys

Key to all Ammothea species (Clark,1977)

Diagnosis References

Flynn, T.T. 1919. Two new Australian Pycnogonida. Papers and Proceedings of the Royal Society of Tasmania 1918: 91-100 [97]

(no title)

bain:
For the Achelia vs Ammothea controversy see Stock (1954, p. 105)

Stock (1973A) placed Ammothea ovatoides into a new subgenus Lecythorhynchus and placed Ammothea australiensis into another new subgenus Ammothea, but neither change has been very widely accepted.

Stock (1973, p. 102) agrees with Clark (1963) that Ammothea australiensis and Ammothea magniceps Thompson, 1884 are two distinct species. Child (1998b, p. 19) is also in agreement with this.

General References

Clark, W.C. 1963. Australian Pycnogonida. Records of the Australian Museum 26(1): 1-81 [57]

Clark, W.C. 1977. The genus Ammothea Leach (Pycnogonida) in New Zealand waters: new species and a review. Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand 7(2): 171-187

Stock, J.H. 1973. Pycnogonida from south-eastern Australia. Beaufortia 20(266): 99-127

History of changes