Rogas (Heterospilus) quaestor Haliday

Marsh, Paul M., Wild, Alexander L. & Whitfield, James B., 2013, The Doryctinae (Braconidae) of Costa Rica: genera and species of the tribe Heterospilini, ZooKeys 347, pp. 1-474 : 20-21

Rogas (Heterospilus) quaestor Haliday

Description.

Description of female lectotype designated by van Achterberg 1997.

Borrowed from Irish National Museum, June 2010.

Body length: 3.5 mm. Color: head light honey yellow, mesosoma and metasoma dark honey yellow; scape light honey yellow, flagellum brown; legs light honey yellow, apical tarsomeres brown; stigma yellow, remainder if veins light brown. Head: vertex and frons transversely striate, face and temple smooth; malar space about 1/3 eye height; temple slightly less that eye width, sloping behind eye, not bulging; ocell-ocular distance about 2.5 times diameter of lateral ocellus; 27 flagellomeres remain (incomplete). Mesosoma: propleuron smooth; pronotum with lateral groove scrobiculate and with distinct carina along lower edge, rugose below groove, granulate above groove; mesoscutal lobes granulate, notauli distinctly scrobiculate, meeting before scutellar groove in triangular rugose area; prescutellar furrow with 5 cross carinae; scutellum weakly granulate; mesopleuron smooth with weak striation dorsally, subalar groove strongly scrobiculate; episternal scrobe weak, precoxal suture (sternaulus) finely scrobiculate and about 23 length of mesopleuron; venter weakly granulate, median longitudinal groove narrow, scrobiculate; propodeum with basal median areas granulate and margined by distinct carinae, median basal carina distinct and about as long as first flagellomere, areola not distinctly margined, areola area rugose, lateral area entirely rugose. Wings: fore wing vein r about 2/3 length of vein 3RSa, vein 2RS entirely spectral except for short stub at junction of r and 3RSa, vein 1cu-a distinctly beyond vein 1M by about 1/2 its length; hind wing vein SC+R present and complete, vein M+CU shorter than vein 1M. Legs: hind coxa with distinct antero-ventral tubercle. Metasoma: first tergum with apical width about 2/3 length, longitudinally costate, raised median are distinct only at base and defined by 2 short lateral carinae; second tergum short, with width about 3 times length, longitudinally costate, anterior transverse groove distinct, scrobiculate; third tergum entirely longitudinally costate except smooth at apical edge, posterior transverse groove distinct; fourth and fifth terga costate on basal half, smooth on apical half; sixth and seventh terga smooth; ovipositor about half as long as metasoma.

Labels: first, "found in box 73, det C.v.Achterberg 1986"; second, red label "female Rogas (Heterospilus) quaestor Haliday, C. van Achterberg 1986, LECTOTYPE"; third, "Specimen figured, C.v.Achterberg 1986." No locality labels.

Because the specimen did not have a locality label, a question remained as to how this specimen was picked as the holotype. Van Achterberg (per. comm.) stated - "It is based on circumstantial evidence; all the boxes of Haliday had a special arrangement. The Heterospilus was among other specimens from the same collection Haliday worked on. It was also the only Heterospilus in the collection and it is obviously not a European species. On the box was an indication of the origin, but this may be a later one...The locality St. Vincent is primarily based on the fit between specimen and description and the quote in the original description." The locality indicated in Haliday’s description is "Insula Sti. Vincentii." Thus, it seems reasonable that the specimen selected and designated as lectotype by van Achterberg is correct. I have studied several hundred specimens of Heterospilus from the Lesser Antilles Islands in the Caribbean but have not yet been able to find any specimens that fit the lectotype in order to select a homotype.