Synalpheus thai Banner & Banner, 1966

Ashrafi, Hossein, Dehghani, Amir, Sari, Alireza & Naderloo, Reza, 2020, An updated checklist of caridean shrimps of the Persian Gulf and Gulf of Oman, Zootaxa 4747 (3), pp. 521-534 : 523

Synalpheus thai Banner & Banner, 1966

( Fig. 1B, C )

Material. 11 females & 8 males ( ZUTC 6839 ), Tis , Chabahar Bay, Gulf of Oman, 25°21’00”N, 60°35’50”E, sandy/ rocky with cobbles, inside sponges, 06.11.2017, coll. H. Ashrafi.

Habitat and habit. This species in form of pair was found inside sponges of low intertidal and shallow subtidal zones.

General distribution. Indo-Pacific Region.

Remarks. Although Banner & Banner (1966) stated that their paratypes were deposited in both the Prince P. Bishop Museum, Honolulu, Hawaii and Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok, Thailand; according to Dr. Chirasak Sutcharit, there is no S. thai in the collection of the latter museum. In the original description, Banner and Banner mentioned two definite rows of setae on opposing faces of small cheliped’s fingers whereas examining the type material, deposited in Hawaii with the help of Holly Bolick and Ken Longenecker, revealed that three is three definite rows i.e. a row on crest of dactylus, a row on lateral face of dactylus and another on lateral face of fixed finger. Banner & Banner (1966) also noted squame of scaphocerite is reduced and narrow while in the material of this study, squame is either tiny or not exist. Further, the specimens of Banner & Banner (1966) were collected from corals, while the Gulf of Oman’s materials all were collected from sponges. All of these suggests the possibility of being S. thai a species complex that further study especially using molecular data would test this possibility.

Figures

FIGURE 1. Color pattern of A—Alpheus mitis Dana, 1852, female (ZUTC 6860), from Abu-Musa Island, Persian Gulf, photo by R. Abdollahi; B—Synalpheus thai Banner & Banner, 1966, male (ZUTC 6839), from Tis village, Chabahar Bay, photo by R. Abdollahi; C—Synalpheus thai Banner and Banner, 1966, female (ZUTC 6839), data same as male; D—Lysmata kuekenthali (De Man, 1902), hermaphrodite (ZUTC 6841), from Djod village, Oman Sea, photo by R. Abdollahi; E—Conchodytes meleagrinae Peters, 1852, male (ZUTC 6845), from Abu-Musa Island, Persian Gulf, Photo by S. Shahbazi; F—Conchodytes meleagrinae Peters, 1852, female (ZUTC 6845), data same as male.