Pseudothelphusa bisuturalis Rathbun, 1897

Magalhães, Célio & Wehrtmann, Ingo S., 2025, Taxonomic revision and distribution of the freshwater crabs of the family Pseudothelphusidae (Decapoda, Brachyura) from Guatemala, with the descriptions of two new species and keys to the species of all genera, Zoosystema 47 (26), pp. 581-615 : 607

Pseudothelphusa bisuturalis Rathbun, 1897

( Figs 12A; 17)

Pseudothelphusa bisuturalis Rathbun, 1897: 60 ; 1898: 511 (in key), 513, 533, and 537 (in list); 1904: 242 (in list); 1905: 292, text-fig. 84; 1906: 502 (in list). — Young 1900: 216. — Coifmann 1939: 106 (in list).

Potamocarcinus ( Raddaus) bisuturalis – Pretzmann 1965: 3 (in list); 1971: 20 (in list); 1972: 78, figs 475, 476, 553-555.

Potamocarcinus ( Raddaus) bisunturalis – Wehrtmann et al. 2016: 782 (in list) [error].

TYPE MATERIAL EXAMINED. — Syntypes. Guatemala • 3 ♀, in alcohol, syntypes; Suchitepéquez, stream Saint-Augustin, near Atitlán, Pacific slope ; XI.1866; M. Bocourt leg.; n°571D, MNHN Entry 844-1866; MNHN-IU-2017-8063 (= MNHN-B5058 ) .

OTHER MATERIAL EXAMINED. — Guatemala • 2 ♀, in alcohol; Suchitepéquez, stream Saint-Augustin, near Atitlán, Pacific slope ; XI.1866; M. Bocourt leg.; MNHN-IU-2017-8063 (= MNHN-B5058 ) .

REMARKS

Rathbun (1897) described this species based on a female with cw 31.4 mm × cl 19.2 mm but mentioned that the species was represented by three females numbered 571 in Bocourt’s catalogue. Curiously, the single jar contaning the syntypes seen by one of us (CM) at the MNHN contains five (http://coldb.mnhn.fr/catalognumber/mnhn/iu/2017- 8063) females and three labels with the species identity and similar curatorial and location data but in one of the labels is written “ 5 ♀ ” ( Fig. 12A). Rathbun (1897) gave no indication whatsoever of a type specimen but reported measurements for only one of the females. She subsequently illustrated the Mxp3 and the front of one of the specimens which she called the “type” ( Rathbun 1905: 292, text-fig. 84), however, without giving any indication of which specimen she was referring to. In the section “Habitat”, Rathbun (1905) mentioned material from the same collecting site deposited both in the MNHN and the USNM (which would be USNM 20045, not examined, marked as “type” in the catalogue: see at http://n 2t.net/ark:/65665/3102a85dbb40f-4390-8038-8802256fc16b). We could not find any information about these three additional female specimens not mentioned in Rathbun’s (1897) original publication. Pretzmann (1972: 79) designed a male (USNM 85557) as allotype but mentioned it as holotype in the caption of the figures 475, 476, 553-555. This specimen, however, does not belong to the type series.

Rodríguez (1982) conjectured that Ps. bisuturalis could be synonymous with R. bocourti but the fact that the type material of Ps. bisuturalis and that of R. tuberculatus come from the very same locality (“stream Saint-Augustin, near Atitlán, Pacific slope”), in addition to exhibiting high similarity in their somatic characters, could be an indication that Ps. bisuturalis and R. tuberculatus could be synonymous.