Discheramocephalus bisulcatus, Darby, Michael, 2013

Darby, Michael, 2013, Studies of Madagascan Ptiliidae (Coleoptera) 1: The Tribe Discheramocephalini including eighteen new species, Zootaxa 3718 (3), pp. 239-266 : 241

Discheramocephalus bisulcatus sp. n.

( Figs 1 , 19, 21, 27)

Length 0.54 mm. Colour dark reddish-brown, legs and antennae uniformly yellowish-brown. Body sparsely pubescent, smooth and shining. Antennomeres: 1,2 large, 3 attenuated, 4–8 narrow and elongate, 10 and 11 globular, forming a short club, sensillae if present not visible in slide preparation ( Fig. 27 ). Head with eyes almost as broad as pronotum, with a transverse, sulcate groove behind eyes, covered at sides by a thin translucent membrane, and without a lateral bridge from eye to temple. Pronotum 0.15 mm long, 0.18 mm wide, with a longitudinal furrow on each side adjacent to midline not shorter than 90% of pronotal length and flanked laterally by two basal depressions posterior edge with a rounded emargination fringed by hairs in front of the scutellum. Scutellum with a central longitudinal keel separating two large circular foveae, and two smaller, deeper foveae at the anterior angles. Wings present of usual Ptiliid form. Elytra 0.32 mm long, 0.24 mm wide, with a shallow depression at the humeri delimited laterally by a narrow carina. Mesoventrite with anterior angles strongly toothed, median process with two elongate foveae on horizontal face posterior to collar (Fig.21). Abdominal ventrite VIII with two circular foveae at lateral margins.

Female: spermatheca with elongate pump as Fig. 26 .

Male: not known.

Etymology. This epithet is descriptive of the appearance of the dorsal surface of the pronotum.

Remarks. Easily distinquished from vasilii by the narrow, elongate antennomeres 3–8 and the presence of only two longitudinal furrows on the pronotum. This last is shared by four other species of the genus jarmilae Grebennikov, minutissimus Grebennikov, stewarti Grebennikov and brucei Grebennikov, the species most similar to bisulcatus . bisulcatus may be distinquished from these by the apical divergence of the pronotal furrows and the foveae on the horizontal face of the mesoventral process. Grebennikov also illustrates a single unnamed member of the genus from the Korup National Park, Cameroon, which closely resembles brucei. This is clearly separated from bisulcatus by the obtusely angled lateral margins of the pronotum. The spermatheca of bisulcatus is indistinguishable from vasilii in normal preparations.

Type data. Holotype: ♀, Ranomafana, sifting, S. 21o14’ 51’’ E. 47o 24’13’’, 1079 m, 16–18.xi.2010, P. Banar (BMNH). Paratype: ♀, same data as holotype, (BMNH).

Figures

FIGURES 1 – 8. Habitus. 1, Discheramocephalus bisulcatus; 2, D. vasilii; 3, Cissidium banari ♀; 4, C. banari ♂; 5, Dacrysoma ranomafanense; 6, D. varium; 7, D. denticulatum; 8, D. fusum.

FIGURES 25 – 28. Discheramocephalus spp. 25, D. vasilii showing aedeagus in abdomen; 26, D. vasilii spermatheca; 27, D. bisulcatus antennomeres 3 – 11 (hairs omitted); 28, D. vasilii antennomeres 3 – 11 (hairs omitted).