Contributions to the Knowledge of the Alpheid Shrimp 
of the Pacific Ocean 
Part III. On a Small Collection from Onotoa, Gilbert Islands 1 
Albert H. Banner 2 
This paper reports on a small collection of 
snapping shrimp made at Onotoa in the 
southern Gilbert Islands during the summer 
of 1951 by the members of the Coral Atoll 
Research team during the investigation of the 
total ecology of the atoll under the sponsor- 
ship of the Pacific Science Board with funds 
from the Office of Naval Research (Contract 
NR 160-165). Members of the team working 
on the ecology of marine animals were Dr. 
Preston E. Cloud, Jr. of the U. S. Geological 
Service, Dr. Donald W. Strasburg, Dr. John 
E. Randall, and myself. The latter three at the 
time were with the University of Hawaii. 
The study of these shrimp was initiated 
under a grant administered by the U. S. Na- 
tional Museum and the Pacific Science Board 
under a contract between the Office of Naval 
Research, Biology Branch, and the National 
Academy of Sciences (NR 160-175); some 
help in the final phases of the study was 
gained through a grant from the National 
Science Foundation (NSF-G-1754). I also 
wish to acknowledge the aid that was given 
me in the field by Drs. Cloud, Strasburg, and 
Randall. 
In order to save space and time in this 
paper, as in the second study, instead of giv- 
ing complete synonymy and bibliographic 
references for each species, reference will be 
made to the earlier papers of the series when- 
ever a species has been listed before. 
Type specimens of the new species de- 
scribed in this paper will be deposited in the 
1 Contribution No. 97, Hawaii Marine Laboratory. 
2 Department of Zoology and Entomology, Uni- 
versity of Hawaii, Honolulu, Hawaii. Manuscript re- 
ceived April 30, 1956. 
institution from which they were borrowed; 
those types in my personal collection will be 
deposited either in the U. S. National Mu- 
seum or the Bernice P. Bishop Museum. 
Onotoa Atoll 
Onotoa is a small, relatively dry atoll in the 
southern portion of the Gilbert Islands. This 
portion is known also as the Kingsmill Is- 
lands. It lies at 1°47' S., 175°29' E. (north 
anchorage) and is slightly less than 12 miles 
long and 5 miles broad, while the land area, 
reaching along the eastern side of the lagoon, 
is only slightly more than half a mile wide at 
the broadest spot (Fig. 1). The windward or 
eastern side of the atoll has a broad reef flat 
varying from less than 1,000 to more than 
2,000 feet in width; the outer edge of this 
flat is marked by a shallow trough, then a 
higher coralline ridge which breaks up into a 
series of well-developed surge channels; be- 
yond the end of the surge channels is a narrow 
sloping shelf from 10 to 40 feet deep which 
drops off abruptly into deep oceanic water. 
The lagoon is shallow with the deepest meas- 
ured point about 50 feet, while most of the 
lagoon area is less than 12 feet deep; large 
areas near the islands were exposed by low 
tides. The western edge of the lagoon was 
marked by an interrupted series of coral reefs 
growing to near the surface with shallow 
passes between them. The western edge of the 
atoll drops off into deep water almost as 
abruptly as does the eastern except off the 
northern anchorage to the west of the chief 
village. (Dr. Cloud has an extensive report on 
the physical and biological condition of the 
atoll in his 1952 report.) 
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