Phaylomerinthus cinereus Boheman, 1842

Borovec, Roman & Skuhrovec, Jiří, 2017, Systematic position of the Afrotropical species described in Trachyphloeini (Coleoptera: Curculionidae: Entiminae), Zootaxa 4344 (3) : -

Phaylomerinthus cinereus Boheman, 1842

( Figs 4A–E )

Phaylomerinthus cinereus Boheman in Schoenherr, 1842: 192 (original description). Phaylomerinthus cinereus: Alonso-Zarazaga & Lyal, 1999: 153 (catalogue).

Type locality. Original type locality ‘Terra Caffrorum’ [ South Africa, Eastern Cape].

Material examined. 1 ♀ (BMNH): ‘[South Africa, KwaZulu-Natal] Estcourt, Natal, A. Haviland [hw] / G. A. K. Marshall Coll. B. M. 1950-255 [p] / Phaulomerinthus cinereus, Boh. [hw] DET. FR. DESCR. [determinate from description] G. A. K. MARSHALL [p] / Phaylomerinthus cinereus Boheman, 1842 , R. Borovec et J. Skuhrovec det. 2017’ [p] ( Fig. 4A ).

Redescription. Body length 1.94 mm. Vestiture. Dorsal and ventral parts of body except funicle, club and tarsi densely covered by oval appressed scales, 5 across width of one interstria. Elytra with one moderately dense row of semi-appressed oval setae, at apical declivity about as long as half width of interstriae and wider than one appressed scale. Rostrum with sparsely irregularly scattered, short, oval, semi-appressed setae, hardly visible in lateral view. Antenna except club and legs with very short, very slender, inconspicuous semi-appressed setae; club densely finely setose.

Rostrum ( Figs 4A–C ) short and moderately slender, 1.33 × wider than long, widest at base and slightly tapered anteriad, sides straight, at base 1.14 × wider than at apex; in lateral view regularly convex, weakly separated from head by transverse sulcus. Epifrons narrow, slightly longitudinally depressed, widest at apex and distinctly narrowing basad, with weakly concave sides, at base distinctly set off from inner margins of eyes, posteriorly separated from head by slender arched sulcus, partly covered by appressed scales. Frons very short, glabrous, forming a narrow stripe along epistome, posteriorly gradually intergrading into squamose epifrons. Epistome very small, glabrous, V-shaped, finely carinate posteriorly. Scrobe in dorsal view narrowly reniform, well visible in apical half of rostrum; in lateral view narrow, slightly curved and widening posteriad, directed towards eyes but well separated from them by wide squamose stripe. Eyes large, strongly convex and prominent from outline of head; in lateral view subcircular, placed in dorsal half of head, not reaching dorsal surface. Head wide and short, vertex flat. Mandibles asquamose, trisetose. Submentum with a median pair of setae.

Antennae ( Fig. 4A ) slender and long, funicle 5-segmented. Scape 1.6 × longer than funicle, exceeding anterior margin of pronotum, regularly curved, moderately slender, equally wide along whole length, in apical third weakly evenly widening apicad, at apex as wide as club. Funicle segments 1 and 2 equally long, segment 1 conical, 1.8 × longer than wide; segment 2 almost parallel-sided, 2.3 × longer than wide; segments 3 and 4 isodiametric; segment 5 1.2 × wider than long; club spindle-shaped, twice as long as wide.

Pronotum ( Fig. 4A ) 1.56 × wider than long, widest at basal quarter, with rounded sides, distinctly more tapered anteriorly than posteriorly, weakly constricted behind anterior margin; laterally weakly convex without ocular lobes or setae on anterior border; base weakly arcuate. Disc regularly convex, without any carina or furrow. Procoxal cavities contiguous, round, in middle of prosternum; procoxae subglobular. Scutellum not visible.

Elytra ( Fig. 4A ) oval, 1.31 × longer than wide, widest at midlength, with regularly rounded sides, apically widely rounded, humeral calli absent; in lateral view convex, slope overhanging apex. Striae narrow, finely punctate; interstriae flat, wide. Mesocoxae semiglobular, narrowly separate. Metacoxae shortly transverse.

Femora of all legs adentate, medially swollen. Protibiae ( Fig. 4D ) at apex externally straight, internally enlarged, mucronate, rounded with fringe of very short and fine, yellowish setae. Metatibial apical surface glabrous, fringed by short and fine spines with long, hook-like mucro and with extremelly slender, glabrous corbel, fringed internally and externally by dense row of fine and short spines. Tarsi short, segment 2 1.6 × wider than long, segment 3 deeply bilobed, 1.6 × wider than long and 1.3 × wider than segment 2; onychia short, as long as segment 3. Claws equally long, solidly fused at basal half, only slightly divergent distally.

Abdominal ventrite 1 behind metacoxa only slightly longer, but at middle about 2.5 x longer than ventrite 2; ventrite 2 shorter than ventrites 3 and 4 combined. Suture between ventrites 1 and 2 straight and fine, the others straight, wide and deep. Metaventral process obtuse, narrow, slightly narrower than width of metacoxa. Ventrites densely squamose.

Female terminalia. Sternite VIII with apodeme moderately short, as long as plate, ending inside of plate; plate longer than wide, with narrow, sharply pointed, arrow-shaped sclerification, apically projecting beyond plate; plate laterally oval, with weakly rounded sides, forming less sclerotised “wings”, with well defined anterior and posterior borders. Gonocoxites of ovipositor elongate, tapering anteriad, with long, slender, setose apical styli, weakly sclerotised. Spermatheca ( Fig. 4E ) with cornu short and weakly curved; corpus rounded; ramus slightly wider than long, rounded; nodulus very long and moderately wide, twice as long and wider than cornu, parallelsided, distinctly curved at midlength.

Remarks. The description of the species and genus was most likely based on a single specimen, as in the majority of other species described by Boheman from South Africa. Boheman (1842) gave its origin as “Patria: Terra Caffrorum. D.D. Ecklon et Zeyher. Mus. Dom. De Winthem”. There is no type specimen with this name in Schoenherr’s collection in the NHRS, as ascertained by the first author during a visit to the NHRS. De Winthem‘s collection is in the Zoological Museum Hamburg, but according to Martin Husemann (pers. comm.) there is no indication that the type of cinereus has been in that museum, either in the collection or listed in any catalogue, and Husemann suggested that “Most likely it got lost during the world war”. We therefore consider the original type specimen lost. We have a specimen closely fitting the original description, but this specimen was collected approximately 800 km from the type locality. According to Article 75.3.6 of the code (ICZN 1999), we do not designate here a neotype for Phaylomerinthus cinereus . But we used this specimen, which was interpreted as representing Phaylomerinthus cinereus already by Marshall, for the redefinition of the genus Phaylomerinthus , because its taxonomic position was unclear from the description.

With the identity of Phaylomerinthus thus fixed, a number of described and undescribed species can be assigned to it. The described ones are scattered under the generic name Lalagetes Schoenherr, 1842 , but because the type species of Lalagetes , L. subfasciatus Boheman, 1842 , is not congeneric with Phaylomerinthus cinereus , both genera remain valid. The transfer of the species not belonging in Lalagetes will be made in a pending revision of Lalagetes , and only two species described as Trachyphloeini are here tranferred to Phaylomerinthus .

Figures

FIGURE 4. Phaylomerinthus cinereus Boheman, 1842, female. A — habitus, dorsal view, scale bar: 1 mm, and its labels, B — rostrum, dorsal view, C — rostrum, lateral view, D — protibia, E — spermatheca, scale bar: 0.5 mm.