Scorpio (genus)

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Scorpio
Scorpio palmatus

Scorpio palmatus

Systematics
Trunk : Arthropod (arthropoda)
Sub-stem : Jawbearers (Chelicerata)
Class : Arachnids (arachnida)
Order : Scorpions (Scorpiones)
Family : Scorpionidae
Genre : Scorpio
Scientific name
Scorpio
Linnaeus , 1758

Scorpio is a genus ofthe Scorpionidae family .

features

The genus includes both dark brown colored animals with lighter legs as well as completely yellowish to reddish yellow colored animals, the telson is usually not distinctly lighter than the metasoma . The carapace has a shallow notch in the middle of the front edge. There are two pairs of three lateral ocelli next to the middle hillock . The median ocular hillock is only slightly raised, the eye keels are less high than the ocelli and are neither extended forward nor backward. The surface of the carapace is coarse to weakly granulated on the sides, smooth in the interocular region and behind in the males, and coarse in the females. On the scissors of the Chelicerae the movable finger is noticeably longer than the immobile one. The chela of the Pedipalps is coarse-grained, its fingers smooth, the outer edge of the immobile finger bears an indentation into which the tip of the movable finger engages. The immobile chelicerene finger is extremely solid and noticeably enlarged laterally.

The genus can be distinguished from the other genera of the Scorpionidae on the following features: From Heterometrus and Pandinus on the lack of the file-like stridulation organ on the hips ( coxes ) of the pedipalps and the first pair of treads , from Opistophthalmus on the lack of stridulatory setae on the upper side of the coxes Chelicerae and Chaetotaxie (position of the sensory hair or trichobothria ).

Ecology and way of life

Scorpio species live in dry, semi-arid habitats with steppe to semi-desert-like, open vegetation. They are strictly nocturnal and spend the daytime in caves they have dug themselves; these can be distinguished from the structures of other burrowing arthropods by their characteristic oval (not round) cross-section. The structures reach a depth of around 40 to 70 centimeters and usually end in an enlarged chamber. They are dug with the help of the chelicerae and the walking legs, with robust bristle combs increasing the effectiveness. Depending on the species or subspecies, different types of soil are populated, in open, uncultivated soil or protected e.g. B. under stones. The typical, special adaptations to sandy soils of the genus Opistophthalmus are not pronounced. Except during mating and brood care, only one individual lives in each burrow.

Area and distribution

The genus is restricted to Africa and western Asia, east to Iran. It lives in North Africa north of the Sahara, from the Atlantic coast to Egypt, on the Arabian Peninsula and in the Levant, north to south of Turkey. While previously no occurrences from sub-Saharan Africa were known, the genus has now been detected in Niger, Sudan and Cameroon. Information also from the Congo Basin turned out to be erroneous (confusion of the location of museum material).

species

According to the traditional view, the genus comprises only one species, Scorpio maurus L., with 19 subspecies. Recent taxonomic revisions elevated many of these subspecies to species and newly described other species, especially from sub-Saharan Africa. The following types are specified (as of 2017):

Phylogeny and Taxonomy

The genus Scorpio was established by Carl von Linné in 1758 and at that time included all the scorpion species known to him at the time. Of the six species mentioned by Linné, three are still considered to be taxonomically valid. These include Scorpio maurus , later determined to be a type of the genus Scorpio . In 1802, Pierre André Latreille established the Scorpionidae family for all scorpions still remaining in one genus, which, according to today's view, still comprises four genera. The genus Scorpio was regarded as monotypical until the 2000s , whereby the broad collective species Scorpio maurus L. comprised numerous morphologically as well as genetically different lines, which were mostly regarded as subspecies . Although this had already struck numerous older editors, they did not break down the species, as the differentiation of the forms from one another did not seem clear enough to them. More modern revisions, including in 2009 and 2015, raised numerous earlier subspecies to the species rank and described others. Ecological differences between the species could also be indicated.

According to the combined analysis of Lorenzo Prendini and colleagues, the sister group of the genus Scorpio is the common clade from the genera Pandinus and Heterometrus .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Lorenzo Prendini, Timothy M. Crowe, Ward C. Wheeler (2003): Systematics and biogeography of the family Scorpionidae Latreille, with a discussion of phylogenetic methods. Invertebrate Systematics 17 (2): 185-259. doi : 10.1071 / IS02016
  2. ^ Wilson R. Lourenço & John L. Cloudsley-Thompson (2012): About the enigmatic presence of the genus Scorpio Linnaeus, 1758 in Congo with the description of a new species from Niger (Scorpiones, Scorpionidae). Serket vol. 13 (1/2): 1-7.
  3. ^ Jan Ove Rein (editor): The Scorpion Files. Trondheim: Norwegian University of Science and Technology. Retrieved November 15, 2017.
  4. ↑ V.Fet, ME Brown Walder, HD Cameron (2002): Scorpions (Arachnida, Scorpiones) Described by Linnaeus. Bulletin of the British Arachnological Society 12 (4): 176-182.
  5. ↑ Lorenzo Prendini & Ward C. Wheeler (2005): Scorpion higher phylogeny and classification, taxonomic anarchy, and standards for peer review in online publishing. Cladistics 21: 446-494. doi : 10.1111 / j.1096-0031.2005.00073.x
  6. ^ Wilson R. Lourenço (2009): Reanalysis of the genus Scorpio Linnaeus 1758 in sub-Saharan Africa and description of one new species from Cameroon (Scorpiones, Scorpionidae). Entomological messages from the Zoological Museum Hamburg 15 (181): 99-113.
  7. ↑ Stav Talal, Itay Tesler, Jaim Sivan, Rachel Ben-Shlomo, H. Muhammad Tahir, d, Lorenzo Prendini, Sagi Snir, Eran Gefen (2015): Scorpion speciation in the Holy Land: Multilocus phylogeography corroborates diagnostic differences in morphology and burrowing behavior among Scorpio subspecies and justifies recognition as phylogenetic, ecological and biological species. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution (online before print) doi : 10.1016 / j.ympev.2015.04.028

Web links

Commons : Scorpio  - collection of images, videos and audio files