Taxonomy of Geocenamus Thorne & Malek, 1968 (Nematoda: Belonolaimidae)

Abstract

The genera Geocenamus Thorne & Malek, 1968 and Merlinius Siddiqi, 1970 are synonymized. The genus contains 67 valid species, of which 14 are discussed in detail. Morphology and infraspecific variability of some characters are considered. New synonyms proposed are: G. gaudialis (Isatullaeva, 1967) and Tylenchorhynchus tatricus Sabova, 1967; G. hexagrammus (Sturhan, 1966) and Nagelus ivanovae Baydulova, 1983; G. nothus (Allen, 1955) and Tylenchorhynchus undyferrus Haque, 1967, Merlinius paramonovi Volkova, 1972, M. nizamii Luqman & Khan, 1986, M. bulgaricus Budurova, 1988; G. rugosus (Siddiqi, 1963) and Tylenchorhynchus cylindricaudatus Ivanova, 1968, Scutylenchus apricus Andrassy, 1980. A key to the species is presented.