Diogenes avarus Heller, 1865

Naderloo, Reza & Türkay, Michael, 2012, Decapod crustaceans of the littoral and shallow sublittoral Iranian coast of the Persian Gulf: Faunistics, Biodiversity and Zoogeography 3374, Zootaxa 3374 (1), pp. 1-67 : 26

Diogenes avarus Heller, 1865

Persian Gulf. Saudi Arabia ( Apel 2001), Kuwait (Jones 1906a), Bahrain ( Nobili 1906a), UAE ( Hornby 1997; Apel 2001), Iran (Moradmand 2007; Apel 2001; present study).

Iran. This species is widely distributed along the Iranian coast and was found at the most of the stations visited during the present study. Moradmand (2007) also recorded it from several stations all Iranian coast, and mentioned that D. avarus is the most common species of hermit crabs of the area.

General distribution. Indo-West Pacific: East Africa, Seychelles, Red Sea, Gulf of Aden, Socotra, southern Oman (Dhofar), Persian Gulf, Gulf of Oman, Pakistan, India, Mergui-Archipelago, Andaman Sea, Thailand, Vietnam, Philippines, Singapore, Indonesia, Australia (Western Australia, Northern Territory, Queensland).

Habitat. Intertidal rocky/cobble, sandy, muddy.

Remarks. Diogenes avarus is the most common species among the decapod crustaceans occurring along the intertidal zone of the Iranian coast (Moradmand 2007; present study). This species shows some distinct variations in a few characters including the form of the large cheliped, spination on the three distal segments of the waking legs, size of the single spine on the upper side of the third antennal segment. Moradmand (2007: 101) has also remarked such variations in his Persian Gulf specimens. Rahayu & Forest (1995) regarded such differences as agedependent variations.