Paranaphoidea Girault, 1913

Huber, John T. & Triapitsyn, Serguei V., 2017, Two genera of Mymaridae (Hymenoptera) new to Africa, a remarkable new species of Anaphes and new generic synonymy, ZooKeys 658, pp. 39-61 : 43

Paranaphoidea Girault, 1913

Idiocentrus Gahan, 1927: 35. Proposed as a subgenus and synonymized under Paranaphoidea by Lin et al., 2007: 43.

Type species.

Paranaphoidea egregia Girault.

Paranaphoidea contains several described species in Australia ( Noyes & Valentine 1989) and one in New Zealand, Paranaphoidea mira (Gahan), that was supposedly reared from Melampsalta muta Fabricius ( Hemiptera : Cicadidae ) ( Gahan 1927). The species name of Paranaphoidea (Idiocentrus) mira , which was transferred to Paranaphoidea by an implied combination at the time of generic synonymy of Idiocentrus by Lin et al. (2007), is an adjective and consequently is being treated here to properly match the feminine gender of Paranaphoidea . Features that define Paranaphoidea include: clava 2- or 3-segmented; face with subantennal groove extending ventrally from each torulus; occiput with a transverse curved groove from eye to eye and medially above foramen; ovipositor projecting anteriorly under mesosoma; and frenum medially divided by a shallow longitudinal groove. The fore wing apex is truncate or rounded and the hind wing is relatively wide in most, but not all, Australian species compared to the rounded fore wing apex and relatively narrow hind wing in the New Zealand species. The ovipositor projects forward under the mesosoma to varying degrees in Australian species and beyond the front of the head in the New Zealand species and also in one undescribed Paranaphoidea (Idiocentrus) sp. from Western Australia (UCRC). The two subgenera are most easily separated by the number of segments in the clava, either two in Paranaphoidea (Paranaphoidea) , as in all the Australian species described so far, or three in Paranaphoidea (Idiocentrus) , as in the single described New Zealand species.

Even taking into account two specimens (CNC) of an unidentified species of Paranaphoidea (Idiocentrus) from Thailand, the presence of a species of Paranaphoidea (Idiocentrus) in West Africa represents a huge extension in range of Paranaphoidea . We thought perhaps that the African specimen was either mislabelled or was accidentally introduced but these possibilities seem unlikely. Other cases of wide ranges in representatives of a genus initially known to occur only in one region are not uncommon in Mymaridae , e.g., Chrysoctonus Mathot ( Huber & Triapitsyn 2015), and intensive collecting eventually results in more specimens of different (or sometimes the same) species from intervening areas being discovered. We treat the specimen below as a new species even though it is extremely similar to Paranaphoidea mira from New Zealand. The recorded host of Paranaphoidea mira , Melampsalta muta is now in Kikihia Dugdale, all of whose species are endemic to New Zealand. It would be interesting to discover the host(s) of Paranaphoidea species that occur outside of New Zealand.