A new species of ocellated Xanthias Rathbun, 1897 (Crustacea: Decapoda: Brachyura: Xanthidae) from the Bohol Sea, Philippines
Author
Mendoza, Jose Christopher E.
text
Zootaxa
2013
3636
2
374
384
journal article
10.11646/zootaxa.3636.2.8
343f524f-f0f7-4ffc-8eea-6db65a9626c1
1175-5326
223767
84E31B3F-9F0F-47CF-A5EF-ADBA8255C66C
Xanthias
Rathbun, 1897
sensu
lato
Remarks.
The genus
Xanthias
Rathbun, 1897
, is poorly defined, and, as presently composed (14 spp.; Ng
et al
. 2008), polyphyletic. A study on the phylogeny of the brachyuran family
Xanthidae MacLeay, 1838
, by Lai
et al
. (2011) showed selected representatives of the genus, including the
type
species,
Xanthias lamarckii
(H. Milne Edwards, 1834)
, falling into separate, independent clades. In the same study, the subfamily
Xanthinae
was also shown to be polyphyletic, with representative species, including those belonging to the
type
genus
Xantho
Leach, 1814
, distributed among at least 10 clades (Lai
et al
. 2011). The implication is that
Xanthias
will have to be properly defined and restricted, and that some of the species included at present will have to be assigned to other genera. For the present work, however, the new species described herein is placed in
Xanthias
sensu
lato
and
Xanthinae
sensu
lato
, with the understanding that it is probably not congeneric with
X. lamarckii
and is probably not a true xanthine. The establishment of a separate genus for this new species is premature, and such action should be done in context, with a proper examination of all the other species of
Xanthias
and the rest of the
Xanthinae
. This would then require a systematic revision at the genus and subfamily levels, which is beyond the scope of the present work.