Measurements. — Carapace: length, 39 mm.; 

 width, 28 mm. 



Color. — Porcelain white with red, vermiculate, 

 transverse lines on cephalothorax, and red dots 

 and blotches on legs. Gibbes, in Rathbun (1937) 

 gave the color of dry specimens as purplish mixed 

 with yellow and orange in places, particularly 

 about the articulations and spines, with the latter 

 having white tips, and the chelipeds, walking legs, 

 and abdominal segments with purplish markings. 



Habitat. — This species appears to be confined 

 to sand bottoms well offshore. Specimens have 

 been obtained in dredge hauls, and fragments of 

 others taken from fish stomachs off North Caro- 

 lina. The species has not been found within Beau- 

 fort, N.C., harbor, nor along the beaches; 7 to 56 

 fathoms. 



Type locality. — Unknown. 



Knoion range. — Off Cape Lookout, N.C., to 

 northwest Florida; Bahamas; Swan Island in 

 Caribbean Sea. 



Remarks. — Though this modern species has no 

 fossil record in North America, the Family Ran- 

 inidae in this region has a fossil record dating 

 from the Cretaceous (Rathbun, 1935). 



Rathbun (1937) reported ovigerous females in 

 April from Florida, and in September from North 

 Carolina. 



Subsection Dromiacea 



Carapace subglobose or subquadrate, frontal 

 region narrow. Last one or two pairs of legs small, 

 subdorsal in position. Abdomen folded under 

 thorax, penultimate segment usually without ap- 

 pendages ; five pairs of appendages in female, first 

 pair rudimentary. Lateral thoracic apodemata 

 united in common center, forming a sternal canal. 

 External maxillipeds with merus and ischium 

 subquadrate (Rathbun, 1937). 



Family Dromiidae 



Carapace subglobular, rarely flattened; no 

 lineae anomuricae (a pair of longitudinal suture 

 lines on carapace). Sternum of female traversed 

 at least in part by two obliquely longitudinal 

 grooves. External maxillipeds generally operculi- 

 form. Legs of moderate size; fourth and fifth 

 pairs short., subdorsal in position, furnished with 

 small hooklike nail or dactyl. Sixth segment of 



abdomen generally with rudimentary uropods 

 (Schmitt, 1921). 



The significance of the obliquely longitudinal 

 sternal grooves on the females of this family has 

 recently been treated by Gordon (1950). She 

 found these to be external evidence of a pair of 

 involuted tubes (variously developed in different 

 species) leading from an external opening at the 

 anterior end of the grooves posteriorly to paired 

 spermathecae enclosed in the endophragmal sys- 

 tem. 



The North American fossil record for this 

 family dates from the lower Cretaceous of Texas 

 (Rathbun, 1935), though no modern species in the 

 Carolinian fauna possesses a known fossil record. 



KEY TO GENERA IN THE CAROLINAS 



a. Carapace firm and hard ; body covered with short 



pubescence Dromidia (p. 143). 



aa. Carapace soft and membranous ; body mostly naked 



Hypoconcha (p. 144). 



Genus Dromidia Stimpson, 1858 



Rathbun, 1937, p. 32. 



Dromidia antillensis Stimpson 



Figure 118 



Dromidia antillensis Stimpson, 1859, p. 71. — Hay and Shore, 

 1918, p. 417, pi. 31, fig. 5.— Rathbun, 1937, p. 33, text-fig. 12, 

 pi. 7, figs. 1-3 (rev.). 



Recognition characters. — Body and legs cov- 

 ered with thick coat of short pubescence, leaving 

 only parts of fingers exposed. Carapace convex 

 in all directions, longer than broad ; frontal region 

 longitudinally grooved along middle; front 

 strongly deflexed, with five small, slender teeth, 

 median three subequal and approximately as long 

 as distance between them at bases, teeth over eyes 

 somewhat shorter but acute. Anterolateral margin 

 of carapace deflected toward corner of buccal 

 area, armed with four or five teeth. 



Chelipeds rather thick and heavy; carpus den- 

 tate with small teeth at anterior angles; palm 

 shorter than dactyl and armed with three blunt 

 spines on upper margin; fingers curved, with 

 strongly interlocking teeth. Walking legs rather 

 slender; last pair turned forward over back, and 

 much longer than fourth pair; dactyls of fourth 

 and fifth legs hooked, closing against unequal pair 

 of distal spines on propodus. 



Measurements. — Carapace of male: length, 32 

 mm. ; width, 31 mm. 



MARINE DECAPOD CRUSTACEANS OF THE CAROLINAS 



143 



