Polydesmida: Paradoxosomatidae: Aethalosoma

Aethalosoma solum Jeekel, 2006

Aethalosoma solum grows to ca 25 mm long and is sometimes day-active. Adults can often be found sheltering under loose bark on standing trees, in both dry and wet eucalypt forest. In the north its distribution ends at the biogeographical divides known as the Mersey Break and the East Tamar Break.

Older adults are almost all dark (top image above) and are much larger than the similarly dark Notodesmus scotius. Juveniles and younger adults (not long after the last moult) have light-coloured paranota (bottom image above).

In 2012, Wade and Lisa Clarkson collected an Aethalosoma male on Mt Direction (East Tamar) with a strange gonopod: straight with no fork at the tip. The Clarksons and I visited Mt Direction repeatedly to collect more Aethalosoma, but all males had the typical A. solum gonopod structure.

Aethalosoma solum is a Tasmanian endemic. It is currently classified in subfamily Australiosomatinae, tribe Antichiropodini.

 

Lateral (left) and medial (right) views of left gonopod; drawing from an illustration by C.A.W. Jeekel

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