Ledomyia vitulans ( Skuse, 1888 ) Skuse, 1888

Kolesik, Peter & Gagné, Raymond J., 2016, Revision of early taxa of Australian gall midges (Diptera: Cecidomyiidae), Zootaxa 4205 (4), pp. 301-338 : 322

Ledomyia vitulans ( Skuse, 1888) , new combination

[ Fig. 12 ]

Cecidomyia vitulans Skuse, 1888: 63 .

Cecidomyia baccata Skuse, 1888: 65 , new combination, new synonym.

Material studied. Holotype male ( ANIC 29-38496 ) of L. vitulans (type label reads “vitulata” in error), “ Elizabeth Bay (Skuse). Beginning of December ”. The holotype has preserved a single wing, two legs with claws, abdomen and terminalia. The single type (male) of L. baccata was collected at the same time and locality as that of L. vitulans and is included by us as other material ( ANIC 29-38481 ) of L. vitulans . Beginning of December.”), deposited in ANIC. It retains a single wing, shrivelled head without flagellomeres, 4-segmented palpi, all legs with slender toothed tarsal claws, empodia slightly longer than claws, and partially shrivelled but examinable terminalia. The two types had originally nine flagellomeres ( Skuse 1888) and are identical in their wing venation, claws, and terminalia, our basis for synonymizing the two species.

Description. Male. Colour (extracted from Skuse (1888) for C. vitulans ): antennae dark brown; head brown with vertex covered with small yellowish scales and few erect hairs; thorax dark brown, with two rows of long yellow hairs; halteres yellowish at base, club with black to dark scales; abdomen sordid yellowish brown, dorsal segments with numerous small brown scales; legs yellowish white, tarsi dusky; wings with brassy reflexion, pale reddish brown at base, densely covered with short pubescence, deeply cilliate along posterior margin and costa, veins brown. Wing 1.0 mm long, 0.5 mm wide, R4+5 curved forward along most of length, reaching near ¾ wing length, C broken at juncture with R4+5, Rs not apparent, Cu forked, wingfold not apparent. Flagellomeres 9, almost cylindrical, twice as long as broad ( Skuse 1888). Terminalia: gonocoxite cylindrical beyond mediobasal lobes; apodemes merged basally; gonostylus foreshortened, dorsoventrally compressed, with sparse setae, microtrichose only basally on venter, otherwise glabous, carinate, tooth about 1/3 length of gonostylus; mediobasal lobe subdivided into two equally long parts, dorsal part long-microtrichose, ventral part closely sheathing one side of aedeagus, nearly as long as aedeagus, glabrous, apically with short seta; aedeagus narrow, blunt apically, slightly longer than cerci and mediobasal lobes; cerci long, narrow, rounded apically; hypoproct broad, concave apically, each resulting lobe with single apical seta. Tarsal claws slender, toothed, slightly shorter than empodia. Legs densely covered with narrow, pale scales basally, and broad, dark scales distally.

Remarks. This is the first record of Ledomyia ( Cecidomyiinae : Ledomyiini ) in Australia. See Gagné (1985) for a revision of xylem-associated North American species. In order to accommodate Ledomyia in the key to Cecidomyiinae genera of Australia and Papua New Guinea ( Kolesik 2014) the following addition is made:

32 Gonostylus dorsoventrally flattened, without microtrichia on dorsum, tooth fully one-third length of gonostylus. Female cerci discrete................................................................................ Ledomyia Kieffer Cosmopolitan , 1 sp., L. vitulans (Skuse) , caught in flight.

– Gonostylus cylindrical, microtrichose at least basally on dorsum, tooth not enlarged. Female cerci fused............... 32a 32a Gonostylus with microtrichia present only basally on dorsum. Female eighth abdominal tergite divided into two longitudinal sclerites.............................................................................. Dasineura Rondani – Gonostylus nearly completely microtrichose, dorsally with microtrichia on at least basal two-thirds. Female eighth abdominal tergite undivided......................................................................................33

Figures

FIGURE 12. Ledomyia vitulans (Skuse). Male. (a) wing, (b) terminalia in dorsal view, (c) tarsal claw with empodium on midleg.