Chrysopidia Navás, 1910

Wu, Jingyu & Liu, Xingyue, 2024, Systematics of the green lacewing tribe Ankylopterygini Navás, 1910 (Neuroptera: Chrysopidae: Chrysopinae) from China, Zootaxa 5540 (1), pp. 1-169 : 38

Genus Chrysopidia Navás, 1910

Chrysopidia Navás, 1910a: 54 . Type species: Chrysopidia nigrata Navás, 1910a: 55 . Monotypy.

Diagnosis. Body medium-sized. Body length 8.3–12.5 mm, forewing length 12.8–17.5 mm, hindwing length 11.9–15.1 mm. This genus is characterized by the presence of the head sometimes with reddish stripes behind compound eyes, the antennae sometimes with reddish stripes on the outer side, the frons, clypeus and gena without spots, the maxillary palpi black on outer side, the pale yellow labial palpi, the pronotum occasionally with pale brown markings on lateral margin, the mesoprescutum occasionally with reddish quadrate spots, the metanotum usually without spots, the legs with dense setae and without spots, the pretarsal claw with basal dilation, the narrow forewing, the indistinct pterostigma, the sinuate radial crossveins in apical half, the cell im usually triangular, the gradates in two or three divergent rows, the basal crossvein of inner gradate series meeting Psm, the opened cell dcc, the narrow hindwing with black suffusion on apical posterior margin, the male sternum VIII fused with sternum IX, the sternum IX elongated in various degrees, the entoprocessus in different shapes and with many long gonosetae on associated membrane, the short arcessus, the apically bilobed female subgenitale, the thin spermatheca, the short vela, the absence of the ventral impression, and the long curved duct.

Distribution. Palaearctic and Oriental regions.

Remarks. Navás (1910a) established the genus Chrysopidia with C. nigrata as type species. At first, gradates of all species of this genus are arranged into three divergent rows. In fact, this character is also present in other genera, such as Apertochrysa , Anachrysa , etc. Chrysopidia can be distinguished by sinuate radial crossveins on apical half and the absence of tignum and gonapsis. Anachrysa was established as a subgenus of Chrysopidia by Hölzel (1973), and then transferred to Chrysopini as a genus because of the presence of tignum and gonapsis ( Breitkreuz et al. 2022).

The subgenus Chrysotropia , with gradates arranged into two divergent rows, was established as a genus by Navás (1911a) initially, and then treated as a subgenus of Chrysopidia based on extremely similar genital characters ( Brooks & Barnard 1990). At present, Chrysopidia includes two subgenera: Chrysopidia and Chrysotropia .

The species of the genus Chrysopidia are very similar in external morphological characters. Only few characters, such as the spots on thorax or stripes behind compound eyes and the relative location of 1st rs-psm crossvein and cell im, are useful for identification. The length of male sternum IX and the shape of entoprocessus are also important characters.

Key to subgenera of Chrysopidia

1. Gradates of forewing and hindwing in three divergent rows........................................... Chrysopidia Gradates of forewing and hindwing in two divergent rows............................................ Chrysotropia