New Species of Terrestrial Isopods (Isopoda, Oniscidea) From Greece

Abstract

Three new species of Oniscidea from Greece are described in the present paper. The first belongs to the genus Ligidium Brandt, being the seventh Greek species of this genus. The next is the second species of Paraschizidium Verhoeff reported from the Balkans and the third is a new species of the genus Schizidium Verhoeff, which is represented in Greece by three more species, one of them troglobitic. The male of Ligidium werneri Strouhal, 1937 is also described here. The systematic status of this species, endemic for Greece, remained dubious since its original description was based on female specimens only (Strouhal, 1937). The validity of its specific ranking is now confirmed, since the male specimens collected on the island of Lesvos (map), near the species' locus typicus, have diagnostic characters definitively distinct from all other known species of Ligidium. The collecting sites for all species referred to, are shown in the map. All the material has been collected by the author except for the material of L. werneri that has been collected by Y. Bazos.