Biology:Potamonautes

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Short description: Genus of crabs

Potamonautes
Temporal range: Late Cretaceous–Recent
Potamonautes sidneyi water Umdoni.JPG
Potamonautes sidneyi
Scientific classification e
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Class: Malacostraca
Order: Decapoda
Suborder: Pleocyemata
Infraorder: Brachyura
Family: Potamonautidae
Subfamily: Potamonautinae
Genus: Potamonautes
Macleay, 1838 [1]
Type species
Thelphusa perlata
H. Milne-Edwards, 1837

Potamonautes is a genus of African freshwater crabs in the family Potamonautidae. It is both the most widespread and most diverse genus of African freshwater crabs, including more than half the species of this continent.[2] They are found in most freshwater habitats of the African mainland and some species are semi-terrestrial.[2]

Species

It contains the following species:[1][3]



One extant species is also known from the fossil record;[4] P. niloticus is abundant in Miocene sediments (6 million years ago) of Lake Albert. Extinct species assigned to Potamonautes are also known from the Late Cretaceous of Niger.[5]

Distribution

Potamonautes are restricted to Sub-Saharan Africa and the Nile Basin, with more than 30 species in East Africa (none on Madagascar , the Seychelles and other offshore African islands), more than 20 in the Congo Basin region, 20 in Southern Africa, 6 in northeast Africa and 5 in West Africa.[2] Although the genus includes common and widespread species, others have very restricted ranges of occurrence.[2] For example, P. dubious is found only in limited parts of the Kunene River and upper Zambezi River in Southern Africa.[6]

References

  1. 1.0 1.1 Peter K. L. Ng; Danièle Guinot; Peter J. F. Davie (2008). "Systema Brachyurorum: Part I. An annotated checklist of extant Brachyuran crabs of the world". Raffles Bulletin of Zoology 17: 1–286. http://rmbr.nus.edu.sg/rbz/biblio/s17/s17rbz.pdf. 
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 Yeo, C.J.; Klaus, S.; and Cumberlidge, N. (2014). Advances in Freshwater Decapod Systematics and Biology. Pp. 86-87. ISBN:9789004207608
  3. Daniels, Savel R.; Bittencourt-Silva, Gabriela B.; Muianga, Vanessa; Bayliss, Julian (2020-09-11). "Phylogenetics of the freshwater crab (Potamonautes MacLeay, 1838) fauna from 'sky islands' in Mozambique with the description of a new species (Brachyura: Potamoidea: Potamonautidae)". European Journal of Taxonomy (716). doi:10.5852/ejt.2020.716. ISSN 2118-9773. https://europeanjournaloftaxonomy.eu/index.php/ejt/article/view/1091. 
  4. Sammy De Grave et al. (2009). "A classification of living and fossil genera of decapod crustaceans". Raffles Bulletin of Zoology Suppl. 21: 1–109. http://rmbr.nus.edu.sg/rbz/biblio/s21/s21rbz1-109.pdf. 
  5. Michael Dobson (2004). "Freshwater crabs in Africa" (PDF). Freshwater Forum 21: 3–26. https://www.fba.org.uk/journals/index.php/FF/article/viewFile/175/75. Retrieved 2011-11-23. 
  6. C.Michael Hogan. 2012. Kunene River. eds. P.Saundry & C.Cleveland. Encyclopedia of Earth. National Council for Science and the Environment. Washington DC.

Wikidata ☰ Q1384585 entry