Palliduphantes, Saaristo & Tanasevitch, 2001

Barrientos, José Antonio, Brañas, Neus & Mederos, Jorge, 2020, The high complexity of Micronetinae Hull, 1920 (Araneae, Linyphiidae) evidenced through ten new cave-dweller species from the Morocco, Zoosystema 42 (1), pp. 1-29 : 24-25

PALLIDUPHANTES IN NORTH AFRICA

Saaristo & Tanasevitch (2001) included 47 species in the new genus Palliduphantes (in addition to other 16 that are synonymized). Of these, nine are found in the Iberian fauna,

four in the Canarian fauna, two in the Algerian and Tunisian fauna, and only one in the Moroccan fauna, P. cadiziensis ( Wunderlich, 1980) . Subsequently several other species have been described: three for the Iberian fauna ( Ribera et al. 2003), two for the Algerian fauna ( Bosmans 2006) and one for Tunisian fauna ( Bosmans 2003). Most of the 58 species currently considered in the genus Palliduphantes ( World Spider Catalog 2018) are found in the western Palearctic zone and primarily in Mediterranean countries. Therefore, considering the size, characteristics and position of Morocco, the description of only two species of Palliduphantes is probably an underrepresentation.

The morphology of the paracymbium and the lamella characteristica of the male of P. banderolatus Barrientos n. sp. conform well to the diagnostic characters of Palliduphantes ( Saaristo & Tanasevitch, 2001) . On the contrary, the female has an elongated epigyne that is loosely consistent with the one described by Wunderlich (1987) for P.longiscapus (Wun - derlich, 1987) of Gran Canaria, or the one presented by P.longiseta ( Simon, 1884) of Corsica ( Muller & Heimer 1991; Bosmans & Colombo 2015). In any case, the consistency and layout of the scape (together with the characters of the male) make P. banderolatus Barrientos n. sp. a clearly independent species. Such a greater length of the female genital structures is also seen in a second species from the south of Morocco, Palliduphantes megascapus Barrientos n. sp., of which the male remains unknown. Therefore the assignment of P. megascapus Barrientos n. sp. to Palliduphantes is still provisional. However, taking into account the morphology of its epigyne, the relationship between P. banderolatus Barrientos n. sp. and P. megascapus Barrientos n. sp. seems to be beyond doubt.