One new species of the genus Sinopoda from Hubei Province, with description of the male of Sinopoda angulata (Araneae, Sparassidae)

Abstract Background In the past year, Prof. Jian Chen conducted several spider collections in Hubei Province. Almost 1000 spiders were collected. After diagnosis, two of them were found to belong to the genus Sinopoda Jäger, 1999. New information Two Sinopoda Jäger, 1999 species, both from Hubei Province, including one new species, are treated in the current paper: S. angulata Jäger, Gao & Fei, 2002 and S. yichangensis sp. n. (♂). The male of S. angulata is described for the first time from Enshi Tujia and Miao Autonomous Prefecture, Hubei Province. New geographic records are provided as well as photos of the copulatory organs and habitus.


Introduction
The genus Sinopoda was established by Jäger (1999), with Sinopoda forcipata (Karsch, 1881) as its type species. Currently, Sinopoda is the fourth most speciose genus of the subfamily Heteropodinae Thorell, 1873, and includes 126 species (Bertkau 1872, Thorell 1873, Plantnick 2020. Of these, a total of 41 species were collected from caves (Plantnick 2020). The species of the genus Sinopoda are small to large spiders whose body length ranges from 3 to 26 mm, with much longer legs relative to their body (Jäger 1999). Members of this genus are known from South-, East-and Southeast-Asia: Brunei, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Laos, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam (Grall and Jäger 2020). From China, 65 species are known; among them, 18 species are only known from females and 4 from males (Plantnick 2020). The species S. angulata was first described based on a female specimen from Shennongjia National Nature Reserve, Hubei Province. Recently, the authors examined specimens collected from Hubei Province and found that two females and two males seemed to belong to this species. One new species of this genus is also described in this paper.

Materials and methods
Specimens were examined and measured with a Leica M205C stereomicroscope. Points arising from the tegular appendages are listed as clock-positions from the left bulb in ventral view. Male palps were examined after dissection and detached from the spiders' bodies and the epigynes were examined and illustrated after dissection. Epigynes were removed and cleared in warm lactic acid before illustration. All photographs were taken with a Leica DFC450 digital camera attached to a Leica M205C stereomicroscope, with 10-20 photographs taken in different focal planes and combined using image stacking software (Leica LAS). Photographic images were edited using Adobe Photoshop CC 2015. Left palps are illustrated. Most hairs and macrosetae are omitted in the palp drawings. All specimens are deposited in the Centre for Behavioural Ecology and Evolution, College of Life Sciences, Hubei University, Wuhan, China (CBEE).

Female.
For details see Jäger et al. 2002.  (Peng, Yin & Kim, 1996) (Jäger et al. 2002: Figs. 6-7) in having the lobal septum half the width of the lateral lobe and posterior part of spermathecae considerably larger than glandular projection, but differ from S. shennonga by: 1) epigynal field with distinct anterior bands (indistinct in S. shennonga); 2) epigyne with lobal pockets connected by an anterior rim (not in S. shennonga); 3) vulva with internal duct running parallel along the median line (diverging strongly anteriorly in S. shennonga). Females of this species can also be distinguished from other Sinopoda spp. by anterior vulva with a massive and angled structure ( Fig. 2D-E , Jäger et al. 2002).

Diagnosis
Males of this new species can be distinguished from all other Sinopoda species except S. angulata and S. pyramidalis (Zhong et al. 2019: Figs 50A-C and 51A-D) in having a thin embolus, as long as embolic apophysis, and embolic apohysis distinctly wider than embolus. It can be distinguished from the other two congeners by the following combination of characters: 1) tip of embolus apohysis with blunt ends (pointed ends in S. angulata and S. pyramidalis); 2) embolus arising from tegulum at 7-to 8-o'clock position in ventral view (6-o'clock position in S. angulata; 8:30-to 9-o'clock position in S. pyramidalis); 3) dRTA is straight with blunt ends in ventral view (slightly curved, with pointed ends in S. angulata; broad, bulging in S. pyramidalis) (Figs 1, 4).

Etymology
The specific name refers to the type locality; adjective.

Distribution
Known only from the type locality (Fig. 7).