Copytus rara McKenzie, 1967

Coimbra, João Carlos, Bergue, Cristianini Trescastro & Ramos, Maria Inês Feijó, 2020, Is Copytus Skogsberg, 1939 (Crustacea: Ostracoda) a neocytherideid? With description of a new family and two new species, Zootaxa 4729 (2), pp. 177-194 : 183

Copytus rara McKenzie, 1967 or Neocytherideis rara ( McKenzie, 1967) ?

Despite Witte’s (1993) comments concerning the similarity of Copytus rara McKenzie, 1967 and C. fusiformis ( Yassini, 1979) , McKenzie (1967, p. 71) noted that this species has “at least 4 adductors, a V-shaped antennal scar and an intermediate fulcral scar”. In figure 2j (a line drawing, p. 66) he drew four adductors in an oblique row. This adductor arrangement is not present in true Copytus species, and militates against these two species being even congeneric, since C. fusiformis has four adductor scars in a small circular group. However, McKenzie states that the “simple pore canals and adont hinge separate this genus from Neocytherideis ”, but some species of Neocytherideis also have simple normal pore canals, while the hinge is barely visible in McKenzie’s material, which was restricted to only three specimens. Hartmann (1978) identified Copytus aff. rara McKenzie, 1967 , in a study on Recent ostracods from the West Australian coast. According to him and the LV drawn in figure 666, the Australian material has much more radial pore canals posteriorly, while the adductor scars are not visible. In our opinion, Hartmann’s species differs from C. rara in many other features, such as the shape and size of the anterior and posterior vestibules and outline. Neil (1993) mentioned the presence of few specimens of Copytus sp. aff. C. rara in Recent and Middle Miocene samples recovered from south-eastern Australia. Gopalakrishna et al. (2007), in a study on the distribution pattern of ostracods in Malabar coast (West India), recorded the occurrence of Copytus sp. aff. rara McKenzie, 1967 , however, their study has no figure or morphological discussion. The length of the holotype of C. rara is 0.95 mm.