Acanthaster planci ( Linnaeus, 1758 )

Haszprunar, Gerhard & Spies, Martin, 2014, An integrative approach to the taxonomy of the crown-of-thorns starfish species group (Asteroidea: Acanthaster): A review of names and comparison to recent molecular data, Zootaxa 3841 (2), pp. 271-284 : 272-273

(1) Acanthaster planci ( Linnaeus, 1758)

Original combination. Asterias planci

Original source. Linnaeus (1758): p. 823, with references to “(p. 662. n. 8–9)” and “Column. phytob. app. t. 38. f. A.”

https://archive.org/stream/carolilinnisys00linn#page/823/mode/1up

Nomenclatural status. Available name.

Type material. Holotype —the only specimen referred to by Linnaeus (1758), the one figured in Plancus (1744), plate XXXVIII (38), fig. A; see remark (2) below .

Type locality. Goa , West coast of (then Portuguese) India.

Remarks. (1) Linnaeus' (1758: Appendix p. 823) first reference under A. planci is to page 662 in the main part of his work, where he treated Asterias laevigata and A. ophiura as species numbers 8 and 9 under "VERMES, MOLLUSCA. Asterias ." This reference is interpreted as indicating nothing more than a relative position in the numbered species sequence assigned by Linnaeus at the time of writing that Appendix. In fact, in the next major edition of "Systema naturae" (the twelfth, i.e. the last one he wrote himself) Linné (1767) followed hardly any of the position suggestions he had made for all species in the 1758 Appendix, and did not even mention Asterias planci anywhere. Instead he introduced a new species, Asterias papposa , as number 2 in the sequence (op. cit.: p. 1098), including a line "Column. phyt. t. 38 f. A?" (p. 1099) referring to the same figure in Plancus (1744) as given under A. planci in Linnaeus (1758). Regardless of Linnaeus´ reasons for this change, the "?" in the reference from 1767 makes the implied synonymy between A. planci and A. papposa a subjective and tentative one, thus does not affect separate availability for the two species names under the ICZN (1999) Code of nomenclature.

(2) The second reference under A. planci ( Linnaeus 1758: 823) points to an illustration in Plancus (1744) that the latter had added to his re-edition of a 16th century work by F. Columna (= Colonna). The illustrated specimen was treated in more detail (not mentioned by Linnaeus) in corresponding text ( Plancus 1744: second unpaginated page behind p. 134), as well as in the letters ("epistolae") by Plancus & Gualtierus (1743), who gave more descriptive data and a more comprehensive illustration than Plancus (1744).

(3) Concerning this holotype specimen Rowe & Gates (1995: 23) wrote "whereabouts undetermined", i.e. did not disclose whether they had tried to locate it anywhere. Searches on our behalf have not found any trace of it in relevant Italian collections in Pisa, Siena, Florence or Bologna (M. Dellacasa, G. Manganelli, G. Innocenti, B. Sabelli, pers. comms 2014). We have not received a reply from Rimini, but our Italian correspondents consider as highly unlikely that parts of the specimen have been preserved anywhere.

(4) The earliest published description of A. planci appears to be the one labeled “Stella Marina Quindecim Radiorum” in Rumphius (1705: book I, p. 39). Linnaeus (1758) referred to Rumphius (1705) under several of his other species names in Asterias , but not under A. planci .

(5) The morphological features of A. planci evident from the plate in Plancus & Gualtierus (1743; see also Birkeland & Lucas 1990: fig. 4) and the plate in Plancus (1744) suffice to rule out species identity with Acanthaster brevispinus Fisher (see below) on account of the long aboral spines, but they are insufficient to assign the illustrated specimen to any of the clades derived from molecular data (see Discussion below). The original diagnosis of A. planci by Linnaeus (1758), “ Asterias stellata lobis quindecim echinatis” [A star-like Asterias with 15 spiny arms] is not helpful here either.

(6) All specimens of the “electric blue” color variety ( Vogler 2010: p. 93) which were checked by COIbarcoding belong to this species.