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The British Woodlice: Being a Monograph of the Terrestrial Isopod Crustacea Occurring in the British IslandsWebb, Wilfred Mark

Science

The British Woodlice: Being a Monograph of the Terrestrial Isopod Crustacea Occurring in the British Islands

Name: The British Woodlice: Being a Monograph of the Terrestrial Isopod Crustacea Occurring in the British Islands
Author: Webb, Wilfred Mark

Webb, Wilfred Mark

Crustacea -- Great Britain; Oniscidae

(A.)--Tail appendages projecting when the animal
         is walking                                  ONISCIDÆ.
      (a.)--Unable to roll up into a complete ball.
            (6.)--Flagellum with 3 joints; abdomen
                   broad; head, with lateral lobes   _Oniscus._
            (7.)--Flagellum with 3 joints; abdomen
                   narrow; head without lateral
                   lobes                             _Philoscia._
            (8.)--Flagellum with 1 joint; eyes
                   wanting; abdomen broad; habitat,
                   ant's nests                       _Platyarthrus._
            (9.)--Flagellum with 2 joints; abdomen
                   broad; frontal lobe projecting    _Porcellio_.
           (10.)--Flagellum with 2 joints; abdomen
                   narrow                            _Metoponorthus._
      (b.)--Able to roll up into a complete ball.
           (11.)--Flagellum with 2 joints; antennae
                   folded together over the thorax
                   when the animal is rolled up
                   into a ball                       _Cylisticus._

  (B.)--Tail appendages not projecting when the
         animal walking                              ARMADILLIDIIDÆ.
           (12.)--Flagellum with 2 joints; antennae
                   hidden or carried at the sides
                   of the head when the animal is
                   rolled up into a ball             _Armadillidium._

=British Species.=--Naturalists in this country paid little attention
to the recognition or description of Woodlice, until the latter half of
the nineteenth century.

In 1857 Kinahan read a paper before the British Association (32) in
which he described fourteen species of woodlice from the British
Islands, and eleven years later when Bate and Westwood published
their book (1), the number had risen to seventeen. One of the species
(_Oniscus fossor_), however, was doubtful, and although Dr. Scharff
in 1894 (63) rejected it, his list contained also seventeen species,
for in the meantime the Rev. T. R. R. Stebbing had found _Ligidium
hypnorum_ in Surrey (70).

Since then the Rev. Canon Norman, Dr. Scharff, the Rev. T. R. R.
Stebbing, and one of the present writers, have added other species, as
will be seen from the following pages, in which all those found, up to
the present time in the British Islands are described and figured.

We shall now consider in detail the British genera and species of
woodlice and give their synonymy and distribution.

_Order_--=ISOPODA.=

_Tribe--ONISCOIDA._


_Section_--=LIGIÆ.=

THE TWO DIVISIONS OF THE TAIL APPENDAGES ALIKE IN SHAPE.

_Family_--LIGIIDÆ.

=Flagellum with ten or more joints; tail appendages wholly visible;
head without lateral lobes.=

_Genus_--=LIGIA= Fabricius, 1798 (27), p. 301.

_Abdomen broad; body large; habitat, the sea-shore._

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The British Woodlice: Being a Monograph of the Terrestrial Isopod Crustacea Occurring in the British Islands

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