Caprithrips Faure

Mound, Laurence A., 2011, Grass-dependent Thysanoptera of the family Thripidae from Australia, Zootaxa 3064 (1), pp. 1-40 : 17

Caprithrips Faure

( Fig. 45 )

Six species are recognised in this genus of small, wingless thrips, all of them leaf-feeding on grasses. The natural distributions of these species remain unclear, but two were described from India, one from Europe, one from Southeastern USA, and one from Australia, and a key to these is provided by Bhatti (1980). Of these six species, C. moundi lacks sternal craspeda and appears to be an Australian endemic, living on native Poa species in the Southeast of the continent. Two other species are known from Australia, both of which have sternal craspeda. C. orientalis has been found both near Darwin and in northern Queensland, and is otherwise known from India, Fiji and New Caledonia ( Bournier & Mound, 2000), as well as Cape Verde Islands (zur Strassen, 1993). Single females of C. insularis have been seen from Queensland, near Brisbane and also near Cairns, as well as from four of the Torres Strait Islands. However, the species is common in Florida and Georgia on the leaves of Paspalum notatum , a cultivated grass native to Argentina ( Sharma et al., 2011), and is also recorded from Trinidad, Surinam, and New Caledonia. Members of this genus share with those of five other genera in Australia the presence of one or more pairs of setae on the prosternal basisternum ( Fig. 45 ) – Masamithrips , Karphothrips, Kranzithrips , Monothrips and Parexothrips . C. moundi usually has the prosternal ferna curving forwards and meeting in the mid-line, but some individuals have these plates forming simple transverse ovals.

Figures

FIGURES 38 – 45. Grass living Thripinae. (38) Exothrips sacchari, head. Parexothrips palumae 39 – 44: (39) head; (40) female sternites VI – VII; (41) tergites VI – VII; (42) tergites VII-IX; (43) meso & metanota; (44) prosternum. (45) Caprithrips insularis, prosternum.