The Micropholcommatinae are a
subfamily
In biological classification, a subfamily (Latin: ', plural ') is an auxiliary (intermediate) taxonomic rank, next below family but more inclusive than genus. Standard nomenclature rules end subfamily botanical names with "-oideae", and zoologi ...
of
araneomorph spiders in the family
Anapidae
Anapidae is a family of rather small spiders with 231 described species in 58 genera. It includes the former family Micropholcommatidae as the subfamily Micropholcommatinae, and the former family Holarchaeidae. Most species are less than long.
...
. They were previously treated as the family Micropholcommatidae.
[ Micropholcommatins are extremely small, with body lengths typically between 0.5 and 2 mm. They are usually found among leaf litter or moss.][
]
Distribution
Many genera are endemic to New Zealand and Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...
, with others found also in South America.
Taxonomy
The families Micropholcommatidae and Textricellidae were synonymized with the Symphytognathidae
Symphytognathidae is a family of spiders with 90 described species in eight genera. They occur in the tropics of Central and South America and the Australian region (with Oceania). Exceptions include '' Anapistula benoiti'', '' Anapistula caecula' ...
by Forster in 1959, but again split from it in 1977.[ Later they were considered to be only one family, namely Micropholcommatidae, by Platnick & Forster in 1986.][ They were synonymized with ]Anapidae
Anapidae is a family of rather small spiders with 231 described species in 58 genera. It includes the former family Micropholcommatidae as the subfamily Micropholcommatinae, and the former family Holarchaeidae. Most species are less than long.
...
by Schütt in 2003[ and by Lopa et al. in 2011,][ a change that has been accepted by the World Spider Catalog.][
]
References
Further reading
* Forster, R.R. (1959). "The spiders of the family Symphytognathidae". ''Transactions of the Royal Society of New Zealand'' 86: 269–329.
* Griswold, C.E., Ramírez, M.J., Coddington, J.A. & Platnick, N.I. (2005) "Atlas of phylogenetic data for entelegyne spiders (Araneae: Araneomorphae: Entelegynae) with comments on their phylogeny". ''Proceedings of the California Academy of Sciences'' 56 Suppl. 2: 1–324.
* Penney, David; Dierick, Manuel; Cnudde, Veerle; Masschaele, Bert; Vlassenbroeck, Jelle; van Hoorebeke, Luc & Jacobs, Patric (2007). "First fossil Micropholcommatidae (Araneae), imaged in Eocene Paris amber using X-Ray Computed Tomography." ''Zootaxa'' 1612: 47-53
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{{Taxonbar, from=Q10635
Anapidae
Spider subfamilies