Malipatilius batantensis Kondorosy & Schmidt, 2024

Kondorosy, Előd, Kovács, Szilvia & Schmidt, Péter, 2024, A review of Malipatilius (Hemiptera: Heteroptera: Rhyparochromidae), with a checklist of Lygaeoidea occurring in the Papuan Subregion, Zootaxa 5477 (2), pp. 147-170 : 163

Malipatilius batantensis Kondorosy & Schmidt , sp. nov.

( Figs. 4 , 17 )

Type material. Holotype. Indonesia, West / Papua, Batanta Isl. / valley of Kalijakut // River , S 00°52’49” - / 54’21” / E 130°38’5 -39” // 14.02.2019. / leg. Kondorosy & T. / Kovács (♀, HNHM)

Description. Colour: Dark species, spots relatively contrasting, especially on corium where elongate spot along clavus almost black and dark parts of exocorium only hardly paler; posterior lobe of pronotum dark brown; scutellum unicolorous black.

Structure: Body rather slender ( Table 3 ). Pedicel only moderately longer than scape, and slightly longer than basiflagellum; latter parallel but not very slender. Humeral angles of pronotum strongly acute. Scutellum slightly wider than long.

Measurements: Total body length: 3.80; head: length 0.61, width 0.68, interocular distance 0.33, eye length 0.23, length of antenniferous tubercle 0.13; length of antennomeres: I 0.50, II 0.68, III 0.61, IV missing, diameter of basiflagellum 0.10; pronotum: length 0.79, maximum width 1.14, width at transversal furrow 0.76, width at anterior margin 0.50; scutellum: length 0.61, width 0.64; length of claval commissure 0.33. Relative measurements see Table 3 .

Diagnosis. M. batantensis sp. nov. is a little more colourful than other species of the genus. A unique feature of the new species is that the pedicel is only 1.35 times longer than the scape, while in all other species this ratio is at least 1.42 but mostly much longer. The acute humeral angles of the pronotum are the most developed within the genus; the only other species having acute (albeit less developed) humeral angles is M. bodisjuditae , sp. nov.; however, M. batantensis sp. nov. is paler, has a shorter and stouter antenna (0.82 times as long as head, while 0.88 times in M. bodisjuditae sp. nov.; basiflagellum 6.12 times longer than wide, while at least 6.89 times in M. bodisjuditae sp. nov.), and the scutellum is also slightly shorter than wide (at least 1.1 times longer in M. bodisjuditae sp. nov.). Although it is rather similar to M. bodisjuditae sp. nov., the above mentioned differences and also the distance between the type localities (eastern vs. westernmost part of the Papuan Subregion) suggest that it is reasonable to treat them as two separate species.

Etymology. The name batantensis is an adjective and refers to the Batanta Island, the type locality.

Distribution. M. batantensis sp. nov. is known only from Batanta Island of the Raja Ampat Archipelago, which is almost connected with the Vogelkop Peninsula through Salawati Island, separated by only narrow channels ( Fig. 17 ).

Figures

FIGURE 17. Distribution of Malipatilius species in New Guinea.

FIGURES 1–4. Dorsal view of Malipatilius spp. 1 M. horvathi Kondorosy & Schmidt, sp. nov.; 2 M. microps Kondorosy & Schmidt, sp. nov.; 3 M. bodisjuditae Kondorosy & Schmidt, sp. nov.; 4 M. batantensis Kondorosy & Schmidt, sp. nov.