Pseudodendrothrips Schmutz

Mound, Laurence A. & Tree, Desley J., 2016, Genera of the leaf-feeding Dendrothripinae of the world (Thysanoptera, Thripidae), with new species from Australia and Sulawesi, Indonesia, Zootaxa 4109 (5), pp. 569-582 : 579

Pseudodendrothrips Schmutz :

There are now 19 species listed in this genus, and all of them seem to be associated with the leaves of Moraceae , particularly various species of Morus and Ficus . These thrips all have unusually elongate hind tarsi, and the sculpture on the abdominal tergites and also the metanotum is remarkably similar among the species. Two species were described from southern Brazil, alboniger and fulvus, and these should probably be placed in Leucothrips as they do not have elongate hind tarsi ( Mound & Marullo 1996). Of the others, 16 are from tropical Asia, with candidus from Cape Verde Island in the Atlantic. In Australia, the record of mori continues to be doubtful ( Mound 1999), as the available specimens are possibly unpigmented individuals of darci . Despite earlier confusion in the literature, there appear to be consistent differences in colour between bhattii and darci . The first is known only from Japan and has uniformly dark fore wings, with the anterior part of the head extensively brown but the pronotum uniformly pale. In contrast, darci has fore wings that are weakly and not quite uniformly shaded, the head is pale with only the interantennal projection dark ( Fig. 28 ), and the pronotum has sublateral dark areas. A similar, but much darker form has been studied from Thailand on Morus , but specimens from Morus in India, identified as bhattii , cannot at present be distinguished from darci .

In Australia, specimens identified as darci have been studied from Queensland (Brisbane; Monto; Carnarvon; Redlynch), Northern Territory (Darwin; Humpty Doo; Bathurst Island), and Western Australia (Kununurra). This species has been taken occasionally from Morus , but is abundant on Ficus virens at Darwin and widespread on Ficus coronata in northern Australia. The reliance on slight differences in body colour to distinguish species of this genus may not be entirely satisfactory. For example, specimens are sometimes taken together with typical darci that lack dark markings on the head and pronotum, and have the fore wings pale. Some of these specimens are thus similar to mori , but others that have antennal segment II pale cannot be distinguished from the description of candidus from the Cape Verde islands.

The antennal segmentation of species in this genus also caused some taxonomic confusion in earlier studies. The distal part of segment VI is commonly separated by a partial or complete suture, thus producing a 9-segmented condition. In contrast, the terminal antennal segments are fused in a few species, thus producing a 7-segmented condition. P. alexei is unusual in that segment VI is subdivided, but the terminal two segments are fused, thus producing an 8-segmented antenna ( Mound & Tree 2007).

Figures

FIGURES 28 – 32. Dendrothripinae. (28) Pseudodendrothrips darci head and pronotum. 29 – 32 Pseudodendrothrips marissae: (29) head and pronotum—paratype female in Hoyers Mountant; (30) head and pronotum—non-paratype female; (31) fore wing; (32) tergites IV – VI.