SUBTERRANEAN AMPHIPOD STYGONECTES 3 



Historical Review 



The earliest description of a stygonectid amphipod is that by S. I. 

 Smith (1874), who described Crargonyx tenuis from specimens col- 

 lected from wells in Middletown, Conn. Subsequent to this descrip- 

 tion and prior to 1911, at least nine references were made to C. tenuis 

 (viz., O. P. Hay, 1882; Underwood, 1886; Packard, 1888; Delia Valle, 

 1893; Stebbing, 1906; Banta, 1907; Weckel, 1907; Holmes, 1909, 

 Stout, 1911), but none of these added any further data to those given 

 initially by Smith. 



Only one other stygonectid was described before the tm-n of the 

 century, this being Crangonyx flagellatus (Benedict, 1896) from an 

 artesian well in San Marcos, Tex. Eigenmann (1900) called atten- 

 tion to this new subterranean amphipod and also mentioned another 

 species from the same well which he called Crangonyx bowersii, but 

 the latter was not described until two years later by Ukich (1902). 

 Uh'ich's description was based on an immature specimen, however, 

 and this species was shown by Weckel (1907) to be a synonym of 

 C. flagellatus. 



W. P. Hay (1903) was the first investigator to point out that C. 

 flagellatus differed generically from other species in Crangonyx, and 

 he created the genus Stygonedes to receive this species. Stebbing 

 (1906) either failed to recognize or was unaware of Hay's new genus 

 and referred to flagellatus as a species of Crangonyx in his extensive 

 monograph of the suborder Gammaridea. Weckel (1907) redescribed 

 flagellatus and, following Hay (1903), placed it in Stygonedes, although 

 she erroneously stated that this species possessed an inner, rudimen- 

 tary ramus on the third uropod. After Weckel's paper, several 

 workers, including Holmes (1909), Uhlenhuth (1921), and Mackin 

 (1935), made reference to S. flagellatus, but none of these writers 

 contributed much additional information on the systematics or ecology 

 of this species. 



Early in the 20th century Crangonyx alabamensis was described by 

 Stout (1911) from a well near Auburn, Ala., and, although this 

 species was a good "candidate" for Stygonedes, it was instead assigned 

 to Crangonyx. A few years later Kunkel (1918) pubhshed a good 

 redescription of Crangonyx tenuis and called attention to a number of 

 its diagnostic characters. Kunkel, however, retained this species in 

 the genus Crangonyx. 



Both Spandl (1926) and Chappuis (1927) in their respective books 

 on subterranean, fresh-water biology referred C. alabamensis, S. 

 flagellatus, and C. tenuis to the genus Eucrangonyx. The latter genus 

 has been generally defunct since the late 1930's or early 1940's (see 



