Newportia (Andeocryptops) shelleyi Tulande-M & Prado & Jiménez & Chagas-Jr 2020, sp. n.

Newportia (Andeocryptops) shelleyi sp. n.

Figures 1–4

Etymology: The specific epitet shelleyi, noun in apposition, is in honor to the great myriapodologist Dr. Rowland M. Shelley, who contributed enormously to the taxonomy of ectonocryptopines.

Material. Holotype: (MPUJ _ENT:0064149): Colombia: Cundinamarca: Tausa: Parque Forestal Embalse del Neusa: Reference forest: Point B-65: (5°9’3.492’’N / 73°56’27,924’’W, WGS84, 3100m), 14 December 2015, coll. Esteban Tulande-M.

Paratypes: 1 specimen per voucher, (MPUJ _ENT:0064150) and (MPUJ _ENT:0064143): same data as holotype; (MPUJ _ENT:0064135), (MPUJ _ENT:0064136), (MPUJ _ENT:0064137) (MPUJ _ENT:0064138) and (MPUJ _ENT:0064145): 18 August 2015; (MPUJ _ENT:0064141): 20 September 2017; (MPUJ _ENT:0064152): 5 April 2017; (MPUJ _ENT:0064146): point B-159: (5°9’0.238’’N / 73°56’29.896’’W, WGS84, 3100m), 14 De- cember 2015; (MPUJ _ENT:0064151): point B-159 (5°9’0.238’’N / 73°56’29.896’’W, WGS84, 3100m), 5 April 2017; (MPUJ _ENT:0064139): point B-46: (5°9’4.145’’N / 73°56’29.245’’W, WGS84, 3100m), 20 September 2017; (MPUJ _ENT:0064140): point B-152: (5°9’ 0.887”N / 73°56’21.454”W, WGS84, 3100 m), 20 September 2017; (MPUJ _ENT:0064142): point B-242: (5°8’56.330”N/ 73°56’24.052” WGS84, 3100 m), 18 August 2015; (MPUJ _ENT:0064144): point B-232: (5°8’56.982”N / 73°56’26”W, WGS84, 3100 m), 18 August 2015; (MPUJ _ENT:0064147): point B-52:(5°9’ 4.144”N / 73°56’25.350”W, WGS84, 3100 m), 12 April 2016; (MPUJ _ ENT:0064148): point B-150 (5°9’ 0.888”N / 73°56’ 22.753”W), 14 December 2015.

Type locality: Parque Forestal Embalse del Neusa, Tausa, Cundinamarca, Eastern Andes Mountains, Colombia.

Diagnosis: As for subgenus.

Description of holotype: Body length 12.70 mm, maximum width of cephalic plate 1.32 mm, length of cephalic plate 1.60 mm. Color of cephalic plate and antenna orange, trunk brown-reddish, legs yellowish (Fig. 1-A).

Setae: Cephalic plate and ventral surface of forcipular segment sparsely covered by short thick setae (when these setae are lost, their round sockets are well visible); tergites and sternites 1–23 with sparse short thick setae; ultimate leg-bearing segment and penultimate sternite bearing more setae; legs 1–20 with lateral spurs.

Antennae: 17 articles, slightly 2 times longer than cephalic plate, barely reaching anterior margin of tergite 3 when flexed; articles 1–3 with evidently longer and thicker setae (less numerous in article 3), articles 4–17 bearing a circlet of longer setae on its basal part, medial and distal part of articles 4–17 densely covered with small setae; ultimate article longest, ca. 1 ½ times as long as previous article.

Cephalic plate: slightly longer than wide (1.2:1), anterior sides slightly rounded, with short paramedian sutures close to margin (Fig. 1-B).

Maxillae 2: Article 3 with well-developed dorsal brush (Figs 1-D, E). Pretarsus pectinated and long (slightly longer than half of telopodite article 3), consisting of two well-distinguishable halves: a dark brown basal and a semi-transparent apical one. Basal half short, apical part hyaline and thinner.

Forcipules: coxosternite without any sutures but with well-developed dark chitin-lines and coxosternal condyles; forcipular trochanteroprefemur without process or toothplates.(Fig 1-C).

Tergites: Anterior margin of T1 covered by cephalic plate. T1 with an anterior transverse suture (Fig. 1-B) forming a very obtuse angle, and with paramedian sutures forked anteriorly, thus forming a “W”; paramedian sutures at T1 not exceeding transverse suture (Fig. 1-B). Sides of TT3-9 slightly curved anteriorly covering a small portion of pleura; TT 2–22 with complete paramedian sutures, TT3–20 with lateral longitudinal sutures, TT17-23 with lateral margination.

Sternites: From SS8-21 with lateral sutures extending to the insertion of legs. S23 as long as wide at the base, strongly narrowed towards the definitely concave posterior margin (Fig. 2-B).

Coxopleuron: with 41 coxal pores 18 of them small; coxopleural process 1/3 longer than S23. A small lateral portion of the pore-field is covered by S23. Posterior margin of ultimate pleuron forming an obtuse angle, its tip rounded. Coxopleural spines with 2 large setae at the basal and distal part (Figs 2 C, D).

Legs: (Fig. 2-E) prefemur and femur slightly flattened dorsoventrally, with setae of different lengths; prefemur, femur and tibia with large seta at the ventral areas, these setae being twice longer and thicker than the rest of the leg setae; tibia 1–20 with lateral spur (tls), tarsus bipartite, tarsal spurs absent, pretarsus 1–22 with one accessory spine pretarsus claw-shaped (Fig. 2-F).

Ultimate legs: prefemur triangular in cross section, with 3 ventral spinous processes, one basal and two ones closer to each other at distal end, with two rows of spine-like setae ventolaterally (Fig. 3-A, ps). Femur: with 2 short ventrolateral spinous processes on right leg and 1 short spinous ventral and 2 ventrolateral processes on left leg (Fig. 3-B,), with a porous area ventrally. Tibia: cylindrical, densely porous, with an uncinate distomedial lobe, (Fig. 3-c 2, Fig. 4-D). Tarsus 1 cylindrical, slightly clavated, densely porous and with a “spinning-spur” (see below, Fig. 3-D); tarsus 2 very short and thin, cylindrical, not segmented (continuous), setose, with various setae apically and without pretarsus (Fig. 3-D).

Variability. Body length ranging between 5 and 13 mm. Color: larger individuals are brown-reddish, juveniles light yellow and very small juvenile of yellow-hyaline coloration, some specimens present 3 spinous process in one leg and 2 in the other. Ultimate legs: length / ratio of the ultimate article varies with developmental stage, juveniles with shorter prefemur, femur, tibia and T1, also the ultimate T2 and the “spinning-spur” on ultimate tarsus 1 breaks very easily if not handled gently, also when broken it’s not easily perceived under light microscopy.

Habitat: All specimens were collected at 3100 m.a.s.l, 16 ones during rainy season (June–January). 15 specimens were collected at 0-10 cm soil deep, and 3 at the 10-20 cm (Soil temperatures ranged from 9.6 C° to 10.4 C°, acidic soil (Ph = 3.5), low soil bulk and real density (0.3g /cm3 and 0.36 g /cm3), these soils has high aluminium content (25.10 cmol/kg) as well as soil organic carbón (29%), and nitrogen (1.30%), the dominant humus form of the organic litter was moder type (Zanella, 2017) (Figure 4).

Accompanied flora: All the individuals were collected inside a remnant of tropical montane forest, the dominant plant species in this forest was Weinnmania tomentosa L.F 1782, at the specific point of extraction, we identified leaf litter from Chusquea scandens, Kunth 1822, Clusia multiflora Kunth 1822, and Myrsine guianesis (Aubl.) Kuntze 1891.

Accompanied fauna: Newportia stolli Pocock, 1896, N. monticola Pocock, 1890, Taeniolinum neusicus Tulande-M, Prado & Triana, 2018. Schendylops sp. (Chilopoda), Chauliognathus sp. Carabidae, Ptilidae, Elateridae (Coleoptera), Oonopidae, Opiliones (Chelicerata), Cryptodesmus sp., Phaneromerium sp. (Diplopoda). Also, Enchytraeid earthworms and different kinds of Diptera larvae (mainly Sciaridae and Phoridae) were identified as the potential prey items.