Synalpheus gracilirostris De Man, 1910

Al-Kandari, Manal, Anker, Arthur, Hussain, Sumaiah, Al-Yassen, Sharifa, Sattari, Zainab & Grave, Sammy De, 2020, New records of decapod crustaceans from Kuwait (Malacostraca: Decapoda), Zootaxa 4803 (2), pp. 251-280 : 259-260

Synalpheus gracilirostris De Man, 1910

( Fig. 5 )

Synalpheus gracilirostris De Man 1910: 291 ; De Man 1911: 269, ( 1915) pl. 10, fig. 49; Banner & Banner 1975: 372, fig. 26; Banner & Banner 1981: 67; Naderloo & Türkay 2012: 13 ; Abdollahi et al. 2020: 8.

Material examined. Kuwait: 1 ov. female, OUMNH. ZC. 2020.01.023, Qit’at Uraifjan , 28°59’53’41”N 48°15’45.31”E, depth 3 m, shallow heavily silted reef, in coral rock crevices, leg. A. Anker, 24.ix.2019 [fcn KUW- 001]; 2 males, OUMNH. ZC. 2020.01.045, Failaka Island , eastern side, in rock crevices, leg. M. Al-Kandari et al., 24.xii.2014 ; 1 male, 1 female (missing major cheliped), OUMNH. ZC. 2020.01.024, Auha Island , intertidal, big rocks, leg. M. Al-Kandari et al., 14.ii.2016 ; 1 male, 2 immature males, KISR, Umm Al-Maradim , east coast, corals, leg. M. Al-Kandari et al., 11.xi.2014 .

General distribution. Widely distributed in the Indo-West Pacific, from the Red Sea, Arabian Gulf, Madagascar to the Philippines and Australia ( Banner & Banner 1975, 1981, 1983; Naderloo & Türkay 2012; present study; but see below).

Ecology. Intertidal to at least 54 m ( De Man 1911; Banner & Banner 1975; present study); typically, in crevices of rocks and coral rocks.

Remarks. Synalpheus gracilirostris was assigned to the so-called S. paulsoni Nobili, 1906 species group (Coutière 1909; Banner & Banner 1975), which was shown to be non-monophyletic in the phylogenetic analysis by Hultgren et al. (2014). This group also includes S. tumidomanus Paulson, 1875 , a highly problematic species complex ( Anker & De Grave 2016), as well as the poorly described S. paulsoni . Banner & Banner (1975) noted that their Australian material of S. gracilirostris presented some significant differences compared to the Indonesian type material of De Man (1910, 1911), suggesting that S. gracilirostris may contain more than one species. The Kuwaiti material is tentatively assigned to S. gracilirostris , despite some minor differences between the ovigerous female from Qit’at Uraifjan and the specimens from Failaka and Auha Islands, for instance, in the proportions of the dactyli of the third to fifth pereiopods. Therefore, a genetic comparison between the specimens from the Arabian Gulf, the Red Sea, Indonesia and Australia will be necessary to confirm the identity of the Indian Ocean and Australian material.

Figures

FIGURE5.Synalpheus gracilirostrisDeMan,1910:ovigerousfemalefrom Qit’atUraifjan,Kuwait(OUMNH.ZC.2020.01.023), dorsal view. Photograph by A. Anker.