Family SPINOTHECIDAE
Introduction
This taxon was erected as a subfamily by Delamare Deboutteville (1961) but is treated here as a family following Betsch (1980), who raised it to family status. There is only one genus and one species known in Australia although there are undescribed species from caves in southern Australia and from rainforest in Queensland.
Diagnosis
Characterised by: thorax I reduced and without setae, mandibular plate present, thorax II to abdomen IV more or less fused and globular, postantennal organ absent, antenna III equal to or shorter than antenna IV, a pair of ridged, inflatable, elongate neck organs present.
General References
Betsch, J.M. 1980. Éléments pour une monographie des Collemboles Symphypléones. (Hexapodes, Aptérygotes). Mémoires du Muséum Nationale d'Histoire Naturelle. Paris Zool. 116: 1-227
Bretfeld, G. 1999. Synopses on Palaearctic Collembola. WinterDruck, Herrnhut : Staatliches Museum für Naturkunde Görlitz Vol. 2 318 pp.
Richards, W.R. 1968. Generic classification, evolution and biogeography of the Sminthuridae of the world (Collembola). Memoirs of the Entomological Society of Canada 53: 1-54
Stach, J. 1956. The Apterygotan fauna of Poland in relation to the world-fauna of this group of insects. Family: Sminthuridae. Cracow : Pol. Akad. Nauk Pt 6 287 pp. 33 pls