Andrena prazi, Wood, 2023

Wood, Thomas James, 2023, Revisions to the Andrena fauna of north-western Africa with a focus on Morocco (Hymenoptera: Andrenidae), European Journal of Taxonomy 916 (1), pp. 1-85 : 8-9

Andrena fuliginata Pérez, 1895 , Andrena gregaria Warncke, 1974 , Andrena poupillieri Dours, 1872 , and Andrena prazi sp. nov.

Praz et al. (2022) identified two putative lineages that could refer to the taxon A. poupillieri , for which the type series has been lost. Wood (2023) designated a neotype (see Fig. 4 ) for the lineage called poupillieri #2 by Praz et al. (2022). This species now has an unambiguous status. The identity of poupillieri #1 appears to be A. gregaria based on type examination and the generation of additional sequences from Morocco ( Fig. 4 ). This species resembles A. poupillieri morphologically, but the terga are much more densely punctate, including punctures on the declivity of T1 (cf. A. wilkella ( Kirby, 1802)) . However, two specimens conforming to this concept had identical barcodes to the barcode of A. fuliginata used in the analysis of Praz et al. (2022). This A. fuliginata specimen (HYMAA289-22) conforms to the type concept ( Fig. 5A–D ) in that it has short dark hairs on the scutum underlying the longer light brown scutal hairs ( Fig. 5B ), the hind tibiae are orange, the terga are almost impunctate, including the declivity of T1 ( Fig. 5C ), and the terminal fringe is dark ( Fig. 5D ). There appears therefore to be some barcode sharing in this group of species; no taxonomic action is taken, and all sequences are grouped together in a broad gregaria / fuliginata aggregate for the time being. This aggregate shows a very low average ‘intraspecific’ variation of 0.37% (range 0.00–0.68%) and has a bootstrap support of 96.

In contrast, a sister clade was formed next to this aggregate consisting of specimens from Morocco originally identified as A. russula Lepeletier, 1841 with dark terga and one specimen from Tunisia with red-marked terga. This clade was separated from the gregaria / fuliginata aggregate by an average of 1.92% (range 1.61–2.74%), and has low average intraspecific variation of 0.44% (range 0.00–1.00%); this clade consequently has a bootstrap support of 94. Morphologically, it cannot be confused with either A. gregaria or A. fuliginata , and so it is described as A. prazi sp. nov. (see diagnosis section for this species).

Material examined

ALGERIA • ♀, lectotype of Andrena fuliginata ; Téniet [ Théniet El Had ]; MNHN ( Fig. 5A–D ) .

MOROCCO • ♀, holotype of Andrena gregaria ; Marraquesh [Marrakech]; 1–31 Mar. 1907; Escalera leg.; OÖLM .

Figures

Fig. 4. Phylogenetic tree (maximum likelihood) of Andrena subgenus Taeniandrena Hedicke, 1933 based on the mitochondrial COI gene. Numbers adjacent to branches represent bootstrap support (values of <75 are omitted).

Fig. 5. Andrena (Taeniandrena) fuliginata Pérez, 1895, lectotype, ♀ (MNHN). A. Label details. B. Lateral habitus. C. Scutum, dorsolateral view. D. Terga, dorsal view.