128 Transaction*. 



Art. XI. — Miscellaneous Notes on some New Zealand Crustacea. 



By Charles Chilton, M.A., M.B., D.Sc, F.L.S., Professor of Biology, 

 Canterbury College, University of New Zealand. 



[Read before the Philosophical Institute of Canterbury, 6th September, 1911.] 



This short paper contains a few miscellaneous notes that have been made 

 during recent years on some New Zealand Crustacea. Though there are 

 many other questions that require to be settled, and several groups that 

 need thorough revision, it has been thought worth while publishing these 

 few notes as they stand, though they are necessarily somewhat discon- 

 nected, and deal with scattered members of the Crustacea. 



Order Decapoda. 



Hymenosoma lacustris Chilton. 



Elamena (?) lacustris Chilton, Trans. N.Z. Inst., vol. 14, p. 172, 

 pi. 8, 1882. Hymenosoma lacustris Chilton, Trans. N.Z. Inst., 

 vol. 15. p. 69, 1883 ; Fulton and Grant, Proc. Roy. Soc. Victoria, 

 vol. 15, p. 59. pi. 8, 1902 ; Chilton, P.Z.S. for 1906, p. 703, 1906. 



This small fresh-water crab was originally described from Lake 

 Takapuna (or " Pupuke "), near Auckland, which is quite near the sea- 

 coast, and for a long time this was the only locality from which it 

 was known, and it was a little uncertain whether it was a genuine fresh- 

 water form or a relict species that had only comparatively recently de- 

 veloped in Lake Takapuna. In 1902, however, Messrs. Fulton and Grant 

 recorded the species from Lake Colac, in Victoria, and about the same 

 time I received several specimens from Norfolk Island. Specimens 

 from all these localities were examined by Messrs. Fulton and Grant, 

 and, although there are a few slight differences, these were found to be 

 not constant, and they decided to consider all the forms as belonging to 

 the one species. 



In 1903 two specimens of the crab were found by Messrs. Hodgkin 

 and Lucas in Lake Waikare, in Auckland, which is a considerable distance 

 from the coast ; and in the early part of this year (1911) a few specimens 

 undoubtedly belonging to the same species were sent to me by Mr. 

 Cheeseman from the Waipa River. 



It seems evident from the above facts that the species is a widely 

 distributed inhabitant of fresh waters, and its occurrence in the fresh 

 waters of New Zealand, Norfolk Island, and Victoria presents a problem 

 of some interest in connection with the geographical distribution of the 

 Crustacea. In connection with this point, it is, however, worth while 

 stating that the fresh-water shrimp in Norfolk Island and Victoria is 

 Xiphocaris convpressa De Haan, and is quite different from the species, 

 X. curvirostris Heller, which is found in nearly all the fresh-water streams 

 of New Zealand, and occurs also in the Chatham Islands. 



