Synonymy of Katianna coeruleocephala Handschin, 1920 (Collembola: Katiannidae) with Bourletiella viridescens (Bourletiellidae)

Abstract

Katianna coeruleocephala was described by Handschin in 1920 from Poespo, Java. It was collected in December, 1896 by Dr. Zehntner with the collecting details given as rotten "Louv" (leaves?) from live orchard. Handschin (1920) labelled his figures of the species (p. 146) as Katianna coerulescephala but the first spelling of the species name (p. 145) has priority. Katianna coeruleocephala has never been recollected. The only mention of the species in the literature since 1920 has been by Suhardjono (1989) in a check list for Indonesia and Suhardjono (2012) who listed it as present on Java and provided the main characteristics of the genus Katianna Börner, 1923. She stated it was a "new" (translate as endemic?) species in Java with a preferred habitat in cold and damp litter but no comment was made on the taxonomic status of the Indonesian species. There has previously been some doubt over both the original generic and family designation given by Handschin in 1920 for the species by both Yoshii (pers. comm.) and Murphy (pers. comm.) who believed it was "likely to belong to the family Bourletiellidae". They did not examine the holotype but based their comments on Handschin's (1920) figure of the mucro which shows it having fairly broad and smooth inner and outer lamellae (Fig. 5). The genus Katianna always has one, the inner, lateral lamella, distinctly toothed. The holotype and single specimen from the Basle Museum of Natural History has been examined and the results are reported here.