Corresponding author: Catherine A. Car (
Academic editor: R. Mesibov
A taxonomic review of the endemic Western Australian millipede genus
All native Australian keeled or flat-backed millipedes (
In Western Australia, the described species of paradoxosomatids fall into five genera:
There is no standardized terminology for the description of paradoxosomatid gonopods which may be highly modified across different taxa (
In this paper, we redescribe the genus and describe a new species of
All of the specimens examined for this study are preserved in 75% ethanol, and are lodged in the Western Australian Museum, Perth (WAM). The specimens of the new species described from the Pilbara region were collected during a joint Department of Environment and Conservation and Western Australian Museum survey of the region, as outlined by
The specimens were examined with Leica MZ6 and MZ16A stereo microscopes and the images were generated with a Leica MZ16A automontage imaging system using Leica Application Suite Version 3.7.0 software. Images of whole specimens and their dorsal views were captured first. The left gonopod from each specimen was then removed and a set of images of the gonopod from four different orientations (posterior, anterior, medial and lateral) was captured. Descriptions were compiled with the software package DELTA (Dallwitz 1999) and the map was generated with ArcMap version 9.3.1 (ESRI Inc.)
Four other genera of australiosomatines, apart from
Modified from
Holotype male: Cave 324, Cape Range, Western Australia, Australia,
Size comparison of the left gonopod (posterior view), of six
This species is restricted to the Cape Range region of Western Australia (
Holotype male: 14.5 km NNW. of Mt Elvire, Pilbara Biological Survey site OYE07, Western Australia, Australia,
This species in known only from two specimens found at Mt Elvire in the Pilbara region (
Holotype male: 6 km SE. of Marda Pool, Pilbara Biological Survey site DRW10, Western Australia, Australia,
This species is named for its tiny size and delicate gonopods (
This species is most similar to
This species is known only from the locality of Marda Pool in the Pilbara Region (
Holotype male: Barrow Island, WSW. of Latitude Point, Western Australia, Australia,
This species is named for the fact that, as the first new species of
This species differs from the four other new species because it is noticeably larger, although it is smaller than
Holotype male:9.5 km S. of Mt Minnie, Pilbara Biological Survey site WYW04, Western Australia, Australia,
This species is named for the solenomere of the gonopod that is more branched than those of other species (
This species may be distinguished from the other small species of
This species had been found from only one locality, Mt Minnie, in the Pilbara region of Western Australia (
Holotype male: 3.5 km N. of Karratha Station, Pilbara Biological Survey site DRW05, Western Australia, Australia,
This species is named for the shape of the gonopods (
This species is similar to
Map of the Pilbara region of north-western Australia showing distributions of
This species has been collected from two localities in the Pilbara: Karratha Station and Marda Pool, situated ca. 50 km apart (
With few exceptions, paradoxosomatid millipede species in Australia are considered to be short-range endemics, defined by
Stephen White of BHP Billiton Pty Ltd and Paul West of Cliffs Natural Resources facilitated the funding for this study for which we are extremely grateful. We wish to thank the staff of the Department of Environment and Conservation, Western Australia, in particular Brad Durrant and Nadine Guthrie, for access to the Pilbara Biological Survey collection. Thanks are due also to Julianne Waldock for laboratory assistance and to Karen Cullen for permission to use the photograph in