Conopsia puehringeri, Sáfián & Bartsch, 2018

Sáfián, Szabolcs & Bartsch, Daniel, 2018, A new species of Conopsia Strand, 1913 (Lepidoptera: Sesiidae: Tinthiinae) from West Africa, Zootaxa 4524 (1), pp. 147-150 : 148-150

Conopsia puehringeri sp. nov.

( Figs. 1A, B ; 2A, B, C )

Holotype: ♂ GUINEA, Nimba Mountains , Cité 1, SMFG concession area. Coordinates: 7°42'2.83"N, 8°23'58.60"W, altitude: 730 m asl., pheromone lures, 17–25.V.2017 Leg.: Sáfián, Sz. ANHRT code: ANHRT00029045 . Deposited in ANHRT.

Paratypes: 8♂♂ GUINEA, Nimba Mountains , Cité 1, SMFG concession area pheromone lures, 17–25.V.2017 ANHRT codes: ANHRT00029046 , ANHRT00029047 , ANHRT00029048 , ANHRT00029049 , ANHRT00029051 , ANHRT00029052 , ANHRT00029053 , ANHRT00029054 ; 1♂ GUINEA, Nimba Mountains , Cité 1, SMFG concession area pheromone lures 17–25.V.2017. Gen. prep.: SAFI00244 , ANHRT code: ANHRT00029050 ; 1♂ GUINEA, Nimba Mountains , Cité 1, SMFG concession area pheromone lures 08.VI .2017 . ANHRT code: ANHRT00029058 (deposited in ANHRT) ; 2♂ GUINEA, Nimba Mountains , Cité 1, SMFG concession area pheromone lures 20–31.V.2017 (deposited in SMNS) .

Etymology. The species is named to honour Franz Pühringer and his work on Sesiidae . Franz also supported the senior author’s interest on African Sesiidae , and helped him to build an important collection.

Description. Alar expanse: 19.5 mm.

Head black with strong silvery gloss; labial palpus completely and pericephalic scales laterally orange-red; eye bald, black; antenna black, filiform, slightly pillose.

Thorax brick-red dorsally, laterally and ventrally somewhat paler orange-red. Legs orange-red; foreleg with tibia and tarsus dorsally black; midleg dorsally with small black spots at tibia proximally and distally, first tarsomere dorso-distally, other tarsomeres dorsally throughout black; hindleg with tibia and first tarsomere dorsodistally, other tarsomeres completely black. Forewing opaque, shiny black, basally small red. Hindwing basally transparent, distally increasingly opaque, dark grey. Ciliae (fringes) of all wings hair-like, black.

Abdomen dorsally brick-red with prominent black longitudinal stripe on tergites 2–7, ventrally orange-red. Anal tuft small, dorso-ventrally flat, black, medially red and ventro-basally with some red scales.

Female unknown.

Variation insignificant.

Male genitalia. Generally weakly sclerotised; uncus long, pointy with strong sclerotized tip, slightly hairy; tegumen broad, angled dorsally; saccus very long, narrow, lanceolate; valvae bi-lobed, upper lobe thumb-like with rounded tip, lower lobe gently pointed; aedeagus (phallus) very long and slender, longer than valva and saccus together.

Diagnosis. Conopsia puehringeri sp. nov. could be confused only with the presumably closely related C. bicolor , however, it is generally slightly smaller with characteristic black stripe present on the dorsal side of the abdomen (stripe missing in C. bicolor ). Further diagnostic characters are: forewing base small red (more extensive red in C. bicolor , particularly along the costa); no red colour is present on hindwing (semi-transparent area on hindwing edged with red in C. bicolor ); antenna completely black (tip red in C. bicolor ); male genitalia with bilobed valva (trapezoid in C. bicolor , ending in a single blunt tip).

Behaviour, habitat and distribution. All specimens were captured at a mixture of pheromone lures synthesised for 15, predominantly Western Palearctic Sesiidae species. Specimens were attracted between 15.30 and 17.00 h at the beginning of the rainy season in mid-altitude savannah and upland forest mosaic in the Nimba Mountains, Guinea. The species’ distribution or habitat requirements are difficult to conclude from the limited material available, however, C. puehringeri sp. nov. could easily be a restricted range species, specialised in upland habitats in the Guinea Highlands or distributed in the Liberian sub-region of West Africa. Using pheromones lures two months later and at the same locality, Conopsia bicolor was also captured in a series of over 20 specimens. The latter species was also found by the senior author in recent years in Liberia and Ghana, as well as together with Franz Pühringer and Norbert Pöll in Ghana in 2011. Furthermore, the series of C. bicolor specimens presented in Kallies (2000) from Nigeria was also collected with the help of pheromones. Overall, these data suggest a wide, West African distribution of C. bicolor . During these earlier surveys, no specimens of C. puehringeri have been collected.

Figures

FIGURE 1. Conopsia species males. A, B, C. puehringeri sp. nov., holotype; C, D, C. bicolor (Le Cerf, 1917) Nimba Mountains, Guinea.

FIGURE 2. Male genitalia of Conopsia. A–C. C. puehringeri sp. nov. (paratype): A, ventral view of valvae, B, lateral view, C, aedeagus. D–F. C. bicolor: D, lateral view (specimen from Nimba Mountains, Guinea), E, lateral view, F, aedeagus (E and F, redrawn from Kallies’ original (2000) illustration, specimen from Ile-Ife, Nigeria).