Chernovskiia Saether

Chernovskiia Saether, 1977: 107 –108.

The males of Chernovskiia are very similar to Paracladopelma Harnisch, both having clubbed or pediform superior volsella covered microtrichiae. However, the males can be distinguished from Paracladopelma by not having the inferior volsella developed as a distinct lobe (Cranston et al. 1989). The larvae of Chernovskiia are rather distinctive, having a strongly curved mandible with a very long apical tooth, strongly concave mentum with heavily striated, coarsely crenated ventromental plate, and body segments subdivided, so the body seems to consist of twenty segments (Pinder & Reiss 1983).

Saether (1977) included three species in Chernovskiia, namely C. orbicus (Townes, 1945), C. macrocera Saether, 1977, and C. amphitrite (Townes, 1945), the last species is Nearctic. Keys or differentiation diagnoses to the species were given by Saether (1977), and Pinder and Reiss (1983); Saether’s key to the larvae includes only two species, C. orbicus and C. macrocera .

There are two records of Chernovskiia from Japan. Kondo et al. (1990: 175) listed C. orbicus from Tamanoi (Kiso River, about 38 km from the mouth), Kisogawa Town, Aichi Prefecture, June 1987; and Kitagawa (1997a: 163–164) described the larva of Chernovskiia sp. CA. from Kiso River, near Tamanoi. As the former specimen is lost, the record could not be verified.