PHYLOGENY/TAXONOMY

 










Genus
Rhagodalma
Genus Rhagodax
Genus Rhagodeca
Genus Rhagodelbus
Genus Rhagoderma
Genus Rhagoderus
Genus Rhagodes
Genus Rhagodessa
Genus Rhagodeya
Genus Rhagodia
Genus
Rhagodima
Genus
Rhagodinus
Genus Rhagodippa
Genus
Rhagodira
Genus Rhagodista
Genus Rhagoditta
Genus
Rhagodixa
Genus
Rhagodoca
Genus
Rhagodolus
Genus Rhagodomma
Genus Rhagodopa
Genus Rhagodorimus
Genus Rhagodorta
Genus
Rhagodospus
Genus
Rhagoduja
Genus
Rhagodula
Genus Rhagoduna
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Family

Pocock 1897

Unidentified rhagodid - Kenya
©Edward S. Ross

Unidentified rhagodid - India
©Sunny Patil |
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Members of the family Rhagodidae are
readily distinguished from other members of the order Solifugae by the
unique hemispherical form of their anal segment and their ventrally
located anus (terminally located in all other groups of solifuges).
Rhagodids are heavy-bodied and short-legged. Many are brightly or
contrastingly colored. The cheliceral dentition is well developed
in both sexes. The flagellum (present only on males) is paraxially
immovable and consists of two flattened, curled setae that form a
curved, truncate horn-like tube on the mesal surface of the chelicera.
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Rhagodids are distributed from northern
Africa through southwestern Asia. The 98 known species
are placed within 27 genera:
Rhagodalma (1 species - Sudan),
Rhagodax (1 species - Jordan),
Rhagodeca (3 species - Israel, Oman,
Syria, Yemen),
Rhagodelbus (1 species -
Uzbekistan),
Rhagoderma (3 species - India,
Israel, Pakistan),
Rhagoderus (1 species - Israel),
Rhagodes (27 species - Afghanistgan,
Azerbaijan, Egypt, Israel, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka,
Tanzania, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Yemen),
Rhagodessa (5 species - Eritrea,
Israel, Sudan, Syria),
Rhagodeya (2 species - Libya, Sudan),
Rhagodia (4 species - Ethiopia, Iraq,
Iran, Pakistan, Turkey),
Rhagodima (2 species - India),
Rhagodinus (2 species - Ethiopia,
Iraq, Israel), Rhagodippa
(1 species - Djibouti), Rhagodira (3 species
- Afghanistan, Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia),
Rhagodista
(1 species - Iran), Rhagoditta (6
species - Algeria, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Iran, Israel, Pakistan,
Somalia, Tunisia),
Rhagodixa
(3 species - Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Pakistan), Rhagodoca (17 species
- Djibouti, Ethiopia, Iran, Kenya, Pakistan, Somalia, Uganda),
Rhagodolus (1 species - Gambia,
Nigeria),
Rhagodomma (1 species - India),
Rhagodopa (4 species - India, Iran, Israel, Kyrgyzstan, Nepal,
Pakistan),
Rhagodorimus
(1 species - Israel), Rhagodorta (1
species - Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia),
Rhagodospsus
(1 species - Iraq), Rhagoduja (1 species
- Iran),
Rhagodula
(1 species - Israel), and Rhagoduna (4
species - Iran, Pakistan, Somalia, Sudan, Syria). No subfamilies are recognized. |

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Original Description:
Pocock 1897a (as Rhagodinae. a subfamily of Solpugidae) -
"This group is established for the reception of the single genus
hitherto known as Rhax, for which I propose the new name
Rhagodes, the term Rhax having been up till
now
used by myself and others in a sense inadmissible according to the rules
of nomenclature I adopt (vide supra under (Galeodes). Like
Biton and Galeodes, Rhagodes is also an alien from the
Palrearctic Region, being found in abundance all over Persia,
Afghanistan, parts of India, and Africa north of the Sahara. On the west
of Africa it extends as far south as Gambia and on the east as far as
Somaliland, Mombasa, and Masailand."
Pocock (ibid,,
page 50) ascribed the following characters to Rhagodinae in a key
tropical African solifuge familes and subfamilies:
"Legs
long or short, fourth pair at most
weakly spined and considerably longer and stronger than the others,
armed with two claws, its coxa and trochanter
much shorter
than the rest of the appendage
and bearing five malleoli on each side in the adult. Abdominal
tracheal stigmata visible
upon
the posterior
margin of the
second
and third sterna, lying
in a triangular
excision of the plates; claws free
from
hairs; tarsus of palp immovably fused
to the protarsus.
Anal
segment
of large
size, transversely elliptical, the anal aperture not
extending
more than halfway from
its lower border towards the dorsal border." He credited Hansen
(1893, p. 191) as having first pointed out the latter character.
Subsequent Accounts: |
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