Thranita pelsarti (Montgomery, 1931)

Thranita pelsarti (Montgomery, 1931) View in CoL # ( Figs. 18 View Fig , 37G View Fig )

? Thalamita danae View in CoL — Morton and Harper 1995: 46, pl. 24C [not T. danae Stimpson, 1858 View in CoL ].

Thalamita pelsarti View in CoL — Tsang et al. 2020: 72, 2 unnumb. figs.

Taxonomy: Wee and Ng (1995: as Thalamita View in CoL ), Crosnier (2002: as Thalamita View in CoL ), Yang et al. (2012: as Thalamita View in CoL ).

Type: Syntypes in NHM 1931.7.24.41-42 ( Crosnier 2002).

Type locality: Pelsaert (= Pelsart) and Long Islands, Abrolhos Islands, Australia.

Distribution: Eastern Indian Ocean to South China Sea and East Asia: verified from Abrolho Islands, Australia, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore, Vietnam, South China, Taiwan and Japan ( Crosnier 2002; Yang et al. 2012).

Habitat: Intertidal and subtidal; close to shores, on substrates muddy or rocky, also common among coral reefs ( Yang et al. 2012).

Remarks: This species had long been considered synonymous under Cancer prymna Herbst, 1803 , until resurrected by Wee and Ng (1995) (see also Crosnier (2002)). Appearing rather common among coral communities in Hong Kong, very likely T. pelsarti has been confounded under past local records of T. prymna . Morphological distinctions between T. pelsarti and T. prymna s. str. have been elaborated in detail by Wee and Ng (1995) and recently by Y.-H. Huang and Shih (2021). The latter work showed, however, molecular evidences based on the mitochondrial COI marker showing substantial but intraspecific level of divergences differences, and both species as well as T. tenuipes (Borradaile, 1902) constitute a thus far unresolved species complex (Y-H Huang and Shih 2021). We herein list both taxa as distinct species.