Taxon classification Animalia Hymenoptera Apidae

Subgenus Schonnherria Lepeletier de Saint Fargeau, 1841

Xylocopa (Schonnherria) Lepeletier de Saint Fargeau, 1841: 207. Type species: Xylocopa micans Lepeletier de Saint Fargeau, 1841, by designation of Sandhouse, 1943: 598.

Xylocopa ( Schönherria) Dalla Torre, 1896, 202, lapsus calami pro Schonnherria Lepeletier de Saint Fargeau, 1841 (not Burmeister, 1855: 417 [ Coleoptera: Scarabaeoidea]).

Shornherria Ashmead, 1899: 71, error for Schonnherria Lepeletier de Saint Fargeau, 1841.

Xylocopa (Schoenherria) Hurd and Moure 1963: 118, lapsus calami pro Schonnherria Lepeletier de Saint Fargeau, 1841.

Xylocopa (Ioxylocopa) Hurd and Moure 1963: 116. Type species: Xylocopa chrysopoda Schrottky, 1902, by original designation; Minckley 1998: 36 [synonymy with Schonnherria].

Xylocopa (Xylocospila) Hurd and Moure 1963: 109. Type species: Xylocopa bambusae Schrottky, 1902, by original designation; Minckley 1998: 36 [synonymy with Schonnherria].

Diagnosis.

Species in the subgenus Schonnherria are small (15 mm) to moderately large bees (~24 mm), often with metallic highlights on all tagmata. Schonnherria can be distinguished from all other New World subgenera of Xylocopa by the following combination of characters: female mandible bidentate (except tridentate in Xylocopa viridigastra Lepeletier de Saint Fargeau, 1841), with apical tooth about as broad as or broader than basal tooth; T1 with complete gradulus on both sexes, remaining terga with gradulus absent (except in the male of Xylocopa bambusae with gradulus also on T2); male genitalia with a large spine of the ventral margin of the gonocoxite and the apex of the gonostylus bifid.