Enguterothrix Denis, 1962

Andrei V. Tanasevitch, 2016, A case of disjunct montane linyphiid species (Araneae) in the Palaeotropics, with notes on synonymy and the description of a new species, Revue suisse de Zoologie 123 (2), pp. 235-240 : 236

Enguterothrix Denis, 1962

Enguterothrix Denis, 1962: 193 ; type species Enguterothrix crinipes Denis, 1962: 193 , figs 33-38; male holotype and female allotype (in MRAC) examined.

Apophygone Tanasevitch, 2014: 395 syn. nov.; type species Apophygone simpulum Tanasevitch, 2014: 395 , figs 8-13, 24-25; male and female paratypes (in ZMMU) examined.

Remarks: The genus Enguterothrix was established for two species, E. crinipes Denis, 1962 from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (the type species) and E. fuscipalpis Denis, 1962 from Uganda ( Denis, 1962). Some years later, Holm (1968) described a third species, E. tenuipalpis from the vicinity of the type locality of E. crinipes . As it will be shown below, E. fuscipalpis does not belong to this genus, E. tenuipalpis is a synonym, and thus the Afrotropical element of the genus is represented by one species only, i.e. E. crinipes .

The monotypic genus Apophygone Tanasevitch, 2014 was established for A. simpulum Tanasevitch, 2014 from northern Thailand ( Tanasevitch, 2014). A comparison of the type specimens of A. simpulum and E. crinipes clearly showed that they are congeneric, thus Apophygone becomes a junior synonym of Enguterothrix .

Diagnosis: See Tanasevitch (2014), under the diagnosis of Apophygone .

Species included: At present, the genus contains two species: Enguterothrix crinipes and E. simpulum comb. nov. (transferred from Apophygone ). Enguterothrix fuscipalpis , known from Uganda ( Denis, 1962), is removed from the genus and preliminarily placed in Micrargus Dahl, 1886 (see below).

Distribution: The genus shows a Palaeotropical disjunct montane distribution: one species, E. crinipes , occurs on mountains of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, a second, very closely related species, E. simpulum , is widespread in the mountains of northern Thailand. This type of disjunction is seen for Linyphiidae for the first time, but it is probably not a unique phenomenon. Further investigations of the Afrotropical and Oriental araneofaunas will likely reveal new examples of this type of distribution. Afrotropical-Oriental disjunctions are known among other groups of spiders, for example in the sparassid genus Barylestis Simon, 1910 (see Jäger, 2008)