Zorocrates colima, PLATNICK & UBICK, 2007

PLATNICK, NORMAN I. & UBICK, DARRELL, 2007, A Revision of the Spider Genus Zorocrates Simon (Araneae, Zorocratidae), American Museum Novitates 3579, pp. 1-44 : 25

Zorocrates colima , new species figures 41, 42 ; map 3

TYPE: Female holotype from 10 miles south of Colima, Colima, Mexico (Aug. 1, 1954; W. Gertsch), deposited in AMNH .

ETYMOLOGY: The specific name is a noun in apposition taken from the type locality.

DIAGNOSIS: Males are unknown, but females can easily be recognized by the wide anterior epigynal margin that is situated just slightly in advance of the posterior epigynal margins ( fig. 41 ).

MALE: Unknown.

FEMALE: Total length 9. Coloration as in Z. blas . Leg spination: femora: I p0-0-2, r0-0- 0; II p0-1-1, r0-0-0; III p0-2-1, r0-1-1; IV p0-0- 1, r0-0-0; patellae IV p0-0-0, r0-1-0; tibiae: I d0-0-0, p0-0-0, r0-0-0; II d0-0-0, p0-0-1, v2-1r- 0, r0-0-0; III r1-0-1; metatarsi: I, II p0-0-0, v2- 2-2, r0-0-0; III r1-2-2. Cribellum present. Anterior epigynal margin wide, situated at about half length of epigynum; spermathecae with paramedian anterior extensions ( figs. 41, 42 ).

OTHER MATERIAL EXAMINED: MEXICO: Colima: 8 mi SW Colima , 19 ° 10 9 N, 103 ° 45 9 W, May 10, 1963 (W. Gertsch, W. Ivie, AMNH), 1♀ .

DISTRIBUTION: Known only from Colima, Mexico (map 3).

THE CHIAPA GROUP

The two new species assigned to this group represent the largest and most southern of the remaining species, are known only from Chiapas, Mexico, and share a darkened abdominal dorsum with a longitudinal median pale band formed of fused chevrons. The males share a bizarrely modified median apophysis, with divergent prolateral and retrolateral projections as well as a third, smaller projection between those two. In both cases, the tip of the tegular apophysis is also bifid. Associations with the females are tentative in each case; females of one species have a strongly protuberant anterior epigynal margin. Females here assigned to the other species, Z. chamula , have a bizarre epigynum, in which the protuberant anterior epigynal margin appears to have become elongated into a scape-like structure extending almost the entire length of the epigynum (unlike a true scape, however, the extension is fused to the remainder of the epigynum).

Figures

Figs. 37–42. 37, 38. Zorocrates chamela, new species. 39, 40. Z. huatusco, new species. 41, 42. Z. colima, new species. 37, 39, 41. Epigynum, ventral view. 38, 40, 42. Same, dorsal view.