Memoirs of the Museum of Victoria 57(1); 1-38 (1998)
DENDROTIIDAE (CRUSTACEA: ISOPODA) OF THE SOUTHEASTERN
AUSTRALIAN CONTINENTAL SLOPE
B. F. Cohen
Department of Crustacea, Museum of Victoria, 71 Victoria Crescent, Abbotsford, Victoria 3067, Australia
Present address: Marine and Freshwater Resources Institute, PO Box 1 14, Queenscliff, Victoria 3225, Australia
(b.cohen@msl .oz.au)
Abstract
Cohen, B.F., 1998. Dendrotiidae (Crustacea: Isopoda) of the southeastern Australian conti-
nental slope. Memoirs of the Museum of Victoria 57: 1-38.
Four new species of Acanthomunna and four new species of Dendrotion are described from
material collected from the southeastern Australian continental slope. A. proteus Beddard,
1886 is refigured. The new species of Acanthomunna represent the first records from Aus-
tralian waters and the new species of Dendrotion represent the first records from waters of the
Southern Hemisphere. A key to the genera of Dendrotiidae is presented along with keys to all
described species of Acanthomunna, Dendromunna and Dendrotion. This paper highlights the
rich dendrotiid fauna of the Australasian region with 10 of the 21 described species found
between the Kermadec Trench in the South Pacific and the east coast of Australia. A table of
habitat and distributional data for all described species of Dendrotiidae is presented.
Introduction
The crustacean fauna of the southeastern
Australian continental shelf is species-rich
(Barnard, 1991; Cohen and Poore, 1994; Poore
and Wilson, 1993; Coleman et al., 1997) but
before the survey by Poore and collegues little
was known of the small crustacean fauna of the
continental slope. Poore et al (1994) found a rich
isopod fauna on the southeastern continental
slope, more diverse than that found on compar-
able slopes in the Atlantic, Arctic and Antarctic,
Dendrotiid isopods are one of the families con-
tributing to this diversity. This paper describing
new species of dendrotiid isopods is based on the
'SLOPE' collection housed mostly at the
Museum of Victoria (Poore et al., 1994).
Dendrotiid isopods are confined to the shelf
and deep sea (130^4885 m, Table 1). Prior to this
study 13 species in three genera had been
described. In this paper four new species of
Acanthomunna are described, the first records of
the genus from Australian waters and increasing
the number of described species world-wide from
five to nine. Acanthomunna proteus Beddard,
1886, from New Zealand is refigured. Four new
species of Dendrotion are also described. They
are the first records of this genus from the South-
ern Hemisphere and increase the number of
described species world-wide from five to nine.
Ten of the 21 species of Dendrotiidae now known
are found between the Kermadec Trench in the
South Pacific and the east coast of Australia;
eight are found on the southeastern Australian
continental slope.
Most of material on which this study is based
has come from the southeastern Australian slope
study, 1986 and 1988 (station prefix 'SLOPE')
carried out by the Museum of Victoria (NMV),
Melbourne (see Poore et al., 1994). Other ma-
terial is from the Bass Strait Survey carried out by
the Museum of Victoria and the Victorian Insti-
tute of Marine Science (Wilson and Poore, 1987),
and from the Australian Museum (AM), Sydney
and the Natural History Museum (BMNH),
London.
The scale bar in the figures is 1 mm and refers
to drawings of whole animals in dorsal view only.
Figure labels are as follows: Al, A2, antenna 1
and 2; PI 7, pereopods 1-7; PL1-5, male
pleopods 1-5; rMD, 1MD, right and left
mandible; MP, maxilliped; MX1, MX2, maxillae
1 and 2, and U, uropods. All illustrations are of
the holotype unless otherwise stated.
The specific epithets of the new species are
genera of Australian kangaroos and their relatives
(Strahan, 1988) chosen only for their euphony,
not to reflect any specific feature of either the
isopod or the kangaroo. All are nouns in
apposition.
BioStor
