Orthochela pumila Glassell, 1936

Ferreira, Luciane Augusto De Azevedo & Anker, Arthur, 2021, An annotated and illustrated checklist of the porcelain crabs of Panama (Decapoda: Anomura), Zootaxa 5045 (1), pp. 1-154 : 44

Orthochela pumila Glassell, 1936

Orthochela pumila Glassell 1936: 296 , pl. 21, fig. 1; Haig 1960: 14, fig. 1, pl. 18, fig. 1; Haig et al. 1970: 22; Hiller et al. 2004: 3; Moscoso 2012: 76, fig. 5A.

Material examined. None.

Previous records from Panama. Haig (1960).

Distribution. East Pacific: Mexico, Costa Rica, Panama (possibly Ciudad de Panamá), Colombia, Ecuador and Peru ( Haig 1960; Hiller et al. 2004; Moscoso 2012).

Ecology. Subtidal, presently known depth range: 1.5–13 m; obligate associate of fan corals, e.g. Eugorgia nobilis Verrill and Muricea robusta Verrill , perfectly matching the colour of their hosts ( Glassell 1936; Haig 1960; Hiller et al. 2004).

Remarks. In the eastern Pacific, O. pumila is the only symbiotic porcelain crab permanently associated with fan corals (gorgonians), specifically those of bright yellow colour. In life, O. pumila is rich yellow with several red lines on the hepatic region of the carapace and with the P1 fingers dorsally ornamented with red blotches (Glassel 1936; Haig 1960). These red markings seem to have faded away in the beige-yellowish Peruvian specimens illustrated by Moscoso (2012), which were photographed after preservation in ethanol (like all other crabs in Moscoso’s fig. 5). Generally, O. pumila seems to be quite rare or at least is difficult to spot and collect by scuba diving. This is probably the main reason, why (to our best knowledge) there are no published in situ colour photographs of the species, showing its vivid, host-imitating colour pattern. Based on information in Haig (1960), most known specimens of O. pumila seem to have been collected by dredges in shallow water, together with their gorgonian hosts. Therefore, the only efficient way to obtain complete specimens of O. pumila (and high-quality colour photographs) might be a limited and careful collecting of large fan corals of genera Eugorgia and Muricea , together with all their associated macrofauna.

Genus Pachycheles Stimpson, 1858