Heterometrus ubicki
| Heterometrus ubicki | ||||||||||||
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Heterometrus ubicki | ||||||||||||
| Kovařík , 2004 |
Heterometrus ubicki is an Indian scorpion in the Scorpionidae family .
description
Adult Heterometrus ubicki are 70 to 90 millimeters in length and have a reddish brown to black body color. The legs are yellow and the telson yellow to reddish yellow. The combs of the comb organ are yellow in color and have 15 to 19 teeth in males and 14 to 17 teeth in females. In the males, the femora , patellae and the hairy chelae of the pedipalps are relatively longer than in the females. The metasoma has a smooth surface and is sparsely hairy. The genital operculum is large and, in females, just as wide or slightly wider than it is long. The telson is hairy and spherical, with a poisonous bladder that is longer than the poison sting . There are individually standing short and long setae on the legs.
Heterometrus ubicki is similar to the species Heterometrus thorellii , but differs from it by its yellow-colored legs and the structure of the patella of the pedipalps. In addition, their areas of distribution do not overlap, Heterometrus thorellii only occurs in Myanmar, while Heterometrus ubicki is only distributed in southern India.
distribution and habitat
The terra typica of Heterometrus ubicki is the Karaikal district in the southern Indian union territory of Puducherry (formerly Pondicherry ). Karaikal District is an enclave of 160 square kilometers in the area of the state of Tamil Nadu ( 10 ° 53 ′ 0 ″ N , 79 ° 50 ′ 0 ″ E ). As part of an investigation of the arachnid fauna at Lake Ousteri, about ten kilometers north of Puducherry , the species was also detected ( 11 ° 59 ′ 0 ″ N , 79 ° 52 ′ 0 ″ E ).
Systematics
Initial description
The first description was made by František Kovařík as part of his 2004 revision of the genus Heterometrus .
Type material
The holotype is an adult male 89 millimeters long, the allotype is an adult female 77 mm long, both of which were collected in 2003. Numerous paratypes were identified, 18 adult males and 31 adult females, two subadult scorpions and four juveniles. Most of the type material is in the collection of František Kovařík in Prague. Of the paratypes, one male, 14 females and three pups are in the collection of the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco . While the Kovařík type specimens were all collected between 2002 and 2004, the collection copies of the California Academy of Sciences date from 1954 to 1964. All material comes from the type where it was found.
etymology
The species name honors Darrell Ubick , an American arachnologist from the California Academy of Sciences, in recognition of his support for Kovařík's work.
literature
- František Kovařík: A review of the genus Heterometrus Ehrenberg, 1828, with descriptions of seven new species (Scorpiones, Scorpionidae). In: Euscorpius , 2004, No. 15, pp. 1-60, online PDF , 6.3 MB.