A pseudoscorpion clinging to a cave salamander: phoresy or failed predation?

Posted by
  A pseudoscorpion clinging to a cave salamander: phoresy or failed predation? Abstract Pseudoscorpions are well known for phoretic associations with arthropods, but interactions with amphibians are rarely documented. Here we report a pseudoscorpion attached to the left palpebral region of an adult male Italian cave salamander, Speleomantes italicus , observed during a visual survey in a karst cave in Tuscany, Italy. The pseudoscorpion, assigned on the basis of visible morphology and locality to Chthonius cf. elongatus , was grasping a minute cutaneous fold on the lower margin of the left upper eyelid with one chela while the salamander moved slowly over the rock surface. No handling was performed and the initial contact between the two animals was not observed. The event therefore cannot be interpreted unambiguously, but may represent opportunistic phoresy or defensive attachment following a failed predation attempt. To our knowledge, this is the first published observation of a ...

Metashinobius gen. nov., the second Asian genus with uncleared subfamily placement of Trechaleidae (Araneae, Lycosoidea) from southwest China, with the description of a new species

Posted by

 


Metashinobius gen. nov., the second Asian genus with uncleared subfamily placement of Trechaleidae (Araneae, Lycosoidea) from southwest China, with the description of a new species

Abstract

Background

Trechaleidae Simon, 1890 is a relatively small spider family comprising 17 genera and 136 species, most of which are distributed in South America and only one genus and three species are distributed in Asia; however, these have never been reported in southwest China.

New information

A new genus, Metashinobius gen. nov., is established, based on a new species from Guizhou Province, southwest China: Metashinobius hikariae sp. nov. (♂). This is the second Asian genus of Trechaleidae. Diagnosis, detailed descriptions, colour illustrations and distribution map of the new species are provided. The type specimen of the new species is deposited in the Centre for Behavioural Ecology and Evolution (CBEE), Hubei University, Wuhan, China.

Cheng Y, Liu J, Wei M (2025) Metashinobius gen. nov., the second Asian genus with uncleared subfamily placement of Trechaleidae (Araneae, Lycosoidea) from southwest China, with the description of a new species. Biodiversity Data Journal 13: e153601. https://doi.org/10.3897/BDJ.13.e153601