Dromiidae de Haan, 1833

Published, First, 2009, New records of crabs (Decapoda: Brachyura) from the New Zealand region, including a new species of Rochinia A. Milne-Edwards, 1875 (Majidae), and a revision of the genus Dromia Weber, 1795 (Dromiidae), Zootaxa 2111, pp. 1-66 : 12-14

Family Dromiidae de Haan, 1833

Dromiinae de Haan, 1833

Dromia Weber, 1795 is the type genus of this subfamily created by Guinot and Tavares (2003). In his revision of the genus McLay (1993) synonymised Sternodromia Forest, 1974 with Dromia and included ten species from the Atlantic Ocean, Mediterranean Sea and Pacific Ocean. Guinot & Tavares (2003) resurrected Sternodromia for S. spinirostris (Miers, 1881) and transferred Dromia monodi Forest & Guinot, 1966 to the same genus. Dromia foresti McLay, 1993 should be transferred to Stebbingdromia Guinot & Tavares, 2003 . On the basis of larval and adult morphological evidence, “ Dromia ” wilsoni ( Fulton & Grant, 1902) is herein transferred to Metadromia gen. nov., “ Dromia ” dormia ( Linnaeus, 1763) to Tumidodromia gen. nov., and restrict Sternodromia to its type species (see below). This leaves six species, which at least in adult morphological terms, form a much more natural group of Atlantic species than when the other five species were included. The species of Dromia are: D. bollorei Forest, 1974 , D. erythropus (George-Edwards, 1771) , D. marmorea Forest, 1974 , D. monodi Forest & Guinot, 1966 , D. nodosa A. Milne-Edwards & Bouvier, 1898 and D. personata ( Linnaeus, 1758) .

The only larvae of Dromia known are those of D. personata and D. erythropus and these share four unique characters (McLay et al. 2001). Note that Dromia gouveai Melo & Campos, 1999 , which was included in the list of Ng et al. (2008), is a synonym of D. erythropus (George-Edwards, 1771) (Marcos Tavares, pers. com). All three of the Pacific species, previously included in Dromia , should therefore be transferred to two new genera, making Dromia sensu stricto an exclusively Atlantic/Mediterranean genus. The type species of the family, D. personata , occurs in both the Atlantic and Mediterranean. The only other large sponge-carrying dromiids in the Atlantic/Mediterranean/Caribbean regions are Sternodromia spinirostris , Moreiradromia antillensis ( Stimpson, 1858) , as well as Metadromia wilsoni , which has been recorded once from Saint Helena, South Atlantic ( Forest, 1974: footnote on p. 89). The relationships between these Atlantic and Pacific dromiids should be explored using molecular characters.

Definitions of the new genera are given below. As a result of the removal of some species, a revised definition (after McLay, 1993) of Dromia Weber, 1795 sensu stricto follows.