Taxonomic revision and phylogenetic hypothesis for the jumping spider subfamily Ballinae (Araneae, Salticidae)

Abstract

The subfamily Ballinae is revised. To test its monophyly, 41 morphological characters, including the first phylogenetic use of scale morphology in Salticidae, were scored for 16 taxa (1 outgroup and 15 ingroup). Parsimony analysis of these data supports monophyly based on five unambiguous synapomorphies. The paper provides new diagnoses, descriptions of new genera, species, and a key to the genera. At present, Ballinae comprises 13 nominal genera, three of them new: Afromarengo, Ballus, Colaxes, Cynapes, Indomarengo, Leikung, Marengo, Philates and Sadies. Copocrossa, Mantisatta, Pachyballus and Padilla are tentatively included in the subfamily. Nine new species are described and illustrated: Colaxes horton, C. wanlessi, Philates szutsi, P. thaleri, P. zschokkei, Indomarengo chandra, I. sarawakensis, Leikung kinabaluensis and Marengo deelemanae. Colaxes nitidiventris and Ballus segmentatus are redescribed. The Seychelles species Baviola spatulata is considered a junior synonym of B. braueri. The phylogenetic analysis suggests two independent origins of tentative Batesian mimicry of ants within Ballinae.

Three new generic records and descriptions of four new species of jumping spiders (Araneae, Salticidae) from Sri Lanka

“…Currently, 64 species placed in 48 genera are known from Sri Lanka (World Spider Catalog 2015). However, recent fieldwork and taxonomic work conducted by us suggests that this is only a fraction of the true diversity of the family on the island (Benjamin 2004(Benjamin , 2006(Benjamin , 2010(Benjamin , 2015. Here we report results of our endeavor to survey and describe this diversity, recording three new genera for the island as well as describing four new species.…”

A new genus and three new species of jumping spiders (Araneae: Salticidae) from Sri Lanka

“…Descriptions of most of the currently known species are 'old' nominal descriptions that lack illustrations. However, this picture has progressively been changing with several 'new' descriptions of salticid taxa (Benjamin 2004(Benjamin , 2006(Benjamin , 2010(Benjamin , 2015Edwards & Benjamin 2009;. The main goal of the present study is to add to this body of data by describing / redescribing several taxa, either new to science or new to the island's biota.…”

Taxonomic descriptions of nine new species of the goblin spider genera Cavisternum, Grymeus, Ischnothyreus, Opopaea, Pelicinus and Silhouettella (Araneae, Oonopidae) from Sri Lanka

“…A large proportion of these species was described over the past two decades (Azarkina 2004;Baehr and Ubick 2010;Bayer 2012;Benjamin 2000Benjamin , 2001Benjamin , 2004Benjamin , 2006Benjamin , 2010Benjamin , 2015Benjamin and Jocqué 2000;Benjamin and Kanesharatnam 2016;Dong et al 2016;Dunlop and Jekel 2009;Eichenberger et al, 2012;Grismado et al 2011;Huber 2005Huber , 2011Huber and Benjamin 2005;Jäger 2003; Kanesharatnam and Benjamin 2016;Kim et al 2013Kim et al , 2014Nanayakkara et al 2012;Platnick et al 2011;Polotow and Griswold 2017;Ranasinghe and Benjamin 2016a, b, c;Smith 2004) and almost all of the new species (55 of 58 new species) are endemics that are presently not known from anywhere else outside of Sri Lanka. Taxonomic studies are necessary to document biodiversity and provide base data for effective nature conservation (Alvarez-Padilla et al 2015).…”