Liriomyza blechi Spencer, 1973

Monteiro, Nilton Juvencio Santiago, Barbosa, Rodrigo Rendeiro & Esposito, Maria Cristina, 2019, Agromyzidae (Diptera: Schizophora) in the state of Pará: new species and new records in Brazil, Zootaxa 4624 (2), pp. 151-182 : 170

Liriomyza blechi Spencer, 1973

Fig. 26–29

Liriomyza blechi Spencer, 1973: 98 (in Spencer & Stegmaier 1973); Spencer, 1990: 215; Spencer et al., 1992: 276; Eiseman & Lonsdale, 2018: 47 .

Diagnosis. Wing length 1.8–2.0 mm. Head, face and antenna yellowish; mesonotum with a central area brown, sometimes paler or becoming orange in some specimens, and with two black lateral bands, sometimes paler anteriorly (Fig. 26–28); scutellum yellowish, sometimes with small spot in lateral corner; calypter greyish-yellow with margin black, fringe black. Aedeagus (Fig. 30 and 31 in Lonsdale 2017): basiphallus slightly sclerotized with membranous extension distally; mesophallus fused to distiphallus, forming two tubules fused basally, enlarged distally; cerci with an elongated seta at apex.

Host-plants. Acanthaceae— Blechum pyramidatum (Lam.) Urb. , Dicliptera sericea Ness , Ruellia blechum L.; Boraginaceae— Heliotropium curassavicum L.; *Gentianaceae— Chelonanthus alatus (Aubl.) Pulle ; Loganiace-ae— Spigelia anthelmia L.; Plantaginaceae— Plantago virginica L. ; Poaceae— Panicum miliaceum L.; Paspalum spp.; Verbenaceae— Phyla nodiflora (L.) Greene.

Distribution. Bermuda, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Dominican Republic, Guadeloupe, Martinica, USA.

Material examined. BRAZIL, Pará state, Belém: Passagem Lindolfo Collor , 1º25′51.0″S, 48º27′11.6″W, 20-I-2006, F.S. Carvalho-Filho [collector], ex leaf of Blechum pyramidatum (4 ♂) ; same location, 20-I-2006, F.S. Carvalho-Filho [collector], ex leaf of Blechum pyramidatum (3 ♀) ; same location, 20-III-2014, F.S. Carvalho- Filho [collector], ex leaf of Blechum pyramidatum (♂) ; Empresa Brasileira de Pesquisa Agropecuária (EMBRAPA), 1º26′10.4″S, 48º26′57.2″W, 08-I-1993, M.C. Esposito [collector], ex leaf of Panicum sp. (14 ♂) ; same location, 08-I-1993, M.C. Esposito [collector], ex leaf of Panicum sp. (6 ♀) ; same location, 09-XI-1993, M.C. Esposito [col- lector], ex leaf of Paspalum sp. (♂) ; same location, 09-XI-1993, M.C. Esposito [collector], ex leaf of Paspalum sp. (3 ♀) ; same location, 08-II-1994, M.C. Esposito [collector], ex leaf of Chelonanthus alatus (2 ♂) ; same location, 08-II-1994, M.C. Esposito [collector], ex leaf of Digitaria sp. (2 ♀) ; Campus de Pesquisa do Museu Paraense Emí- lio Goeldi , 1º26′56.3″S, 48º26′43.2″W, 08-I-1993, M.C. Esposito [collector], ex leaf of Dicliptera sericea (2 ♂) ; Universidade Federal do Pará ( UFPA), 1º28′17.2″S, 48º26′44.7″W, 09-VI-2015, N. Monteiro [collector], ex leaf of Spigelia anthelmia (3 ♂) ; same location, 09-VI-2015, N. Monteiro [collector], ex leaf of Spigelia anthelmia (3 ♀) ; same location, 01-II-2016, N. Monteiro [collector], ex leaf of Spigelia anthelmia (2 ♂) .

Comments. Liriomyza blechi is morphologically similar to Liriomyza marginalis (Malloch) and Liriomyza sorosis (Williston) . It is differentiated from L. sorosis by the seta pattern on the cercus and from L. marginalis by the shape of the aedeagus. Spencer (1990) considers the possibility that this species is a leaf miner of several families within the Asteridae clade, such as Boraginaceae , Verbenaceae , Plantaginaceae , and Loganiaceae . This information has been partially confirmed by Carvalho-Filho et al. (2016), who identified some specimens of L. blechi reared from Spigelia anthelmia L., and by Eiseman and Lonsdale (2018), who listed specimens reared from Plantago virginica L.

The present study records for the first time L. blechi forming mines on leaves of Gentianaceae and showing differentiated shapes of mines between the different plant families. Mines in Poaceae species are linear with frass widely spaced, although mines in Dicliptera sericea and Spigelia anthelmia are similar to L. blechi mines. The mesonotum bands of specimens reared from Dicliptera and Spigelia usually are dark brown (Fig. 26 and 27), but specimens collected in Poaceae usually present the central area of mesonotum are predominantly paler, almost orange (Fig. 28), similar to description of L. marginalis . However, the shape of aedeagus resemble which illustrated by Eiseman & Lonsdale (2018) to L. blechi .