Habronyx albifrons (Spinola)

Porter, Charles C., 2007, Habronyx Foerster (Hymenoptera: Ichneumonidae: Anomaloninae) in Andean and Neantarctic South America with description of new species from Bolivia and Chile, Insecta Mundi 2007 (20), pp. 1-8 : 6-7

Habronyx albifrons (Spinola)

( Figure 7 -9)

Description. Female. Color: antenna black with a broad postmedian white annulus on flagellomeres 27-36; mandible white with black on teeth; head silky black with clypeus and face white, except brown on tentorial pits and for a short distance below antennal sockets, with a white blotch on vertical orbit at top of eye, and a very broad white band on lower 0.5 of hind orbit and in all of malar space; mesosoma black; gaster black with more or less light brown staining on sternites; fore leg with coxa black, trochanter brownish black with a little white on apex, trochantellus more extensively white, femur black with a broad white band on dorsum from near base almost to apex, tibia mostly white except for faint dusky staining below, and tarsus with first and second segments white with a little dusky on apices and segments 3-5 brownish black; mid leg with coxa, trochanters, and femur black, tibia white with dusky staining narrowly on base and a little more broadly on apex, tarsus with first segment white with a little blackish on apex, second segment whitish with diffuse dusky staining and segments 3-5 mostly blackish; hind leg black with a broad white band subbasally on tibia, narrowly white on apex of first tarsomere and white throughout on tarsomeres 2-4; wings hyaline with light, often faint, dusky staining.

Length of fore wing: 10.6-20.1 mm. Flagellum: very long, 0.7-0.8 times as long as body, first segment 4.3-5.5 times as long as deep at apex. Median field of face with numerous, well spaced, rather small shallow punctures, clypeus with even weaker and sparser punctures. Vertex: anteriorly wrinkled, smoother posteriorly, stemmaticum scarcely elevated, ocello-ocular line 1.3-1.5 times as long as width of lateral ocellus and line from ocellus to occipital carina 0.4 times as long. Occipital carina: dorso-laterally curved mesad, a little arched or sometimes almost straight across head behind eyes. Hypostomal carina: conspicuously raised and flange-like. Temple: with many small, sharp, well spaced punctures emitting comparatively short but dense brownish setae. Mesoscutum: silky shining, on most of central and lateral lobes with numerous small, sharp punctures separated by brief smooth interspaces. Mesopleuron: prepectal carina sharply defined, reaching dorsad on about lower 0.4-0.5 of mesopleuron, vertical, its upper end distant from front margin of meospleuron; disc of mesopleuron on its lower 0.3 with complex reticulate wrinkling that obscures most punctures; mesopleural suture more or less carinate along its front margin between speculum and base of mid coxae. Submetapleural carina:only weakly produced near base into a low, rounded lobe. Wing venation: intercubital vein inserted on cubitus at or only a short distance basad of second recurrent vein; nervulus postfurcal by about 0.6 times its length; nervellus vertical, broken below middle, discoidella sclerotized throughout. Hind leg: femur 7.3-8.0 times as long as deep; second hind tarsomere 3.7 times as long as deep. Gaster: postpetiole 1.3-1.6 times as long as wide at apex; first sternite ends at or a little basad of spiracles.

Male. Differs from female as follows. Color: front leg with coxa largely white, trochanter white below, and tarsus white on segments 1-4; mid leg with tarsomeres 1-3 white, 4 white on base and black on its distal 0.7; hind leg with first tarsomere white, second black on basal 0.5 and white on distal 0.5.

Length of fore wing 9.8-18.0 mm. First flagellomere 4.0 times as long as deep at apex. Wing venation: nervulus about 0.7 times its length postfurcal. Second hind tarsomere 2.8 times as long as deep.

Figure 9. Habronyx albifrons , female. Lateral view of head and mesosoma showing (1) sculpture and (2) Material Examined. CHILE, 1 female, Región de coloration. Coquimbo: Pisco Elqui, 6-X-1987, Pérez de Arce;

Región Metropolitana, 1 female , Santiago, 700-800

m, X-1984, L.E. Peña; 25 females and 12 males,

Cajón de Maipo , El Manzano, XI-1989, Pérez de Arce [ FSCA] .

Relationships. This elegant lustrous black species differs from the other known South American Habronyx in its white banded flagellum, prominently white marked head and legs, and in its vertical prepectal carina which extends well dorsad onto the mesopleuron. Gauld (1984) places it in Habronyx s. str. and suggests that it may be related to the Australian H. (H.) australasiae (Morley) .

Habitat Notes. Habronyx albifrons occurs in all parts of the Neantarctic biogeographical province: in Chile from the 30 th parallel south and in adjoining southwest Argentina below the 39 th parallel. In central Chile it may be found in the same Mediterranean sclerophyll woodlands already described for H. citrinus . Indeed, it ranges north into the Coquimban Desert ( Porter 1987) at least as far as the 30 th parallel (Valle de Elqui) where a depauperate and presumably relict sclerophyll flora persists in a few fertile valleys permanently watered by rivers which descend from the snow capped Andes. On the south, it remains abundant in the humid Valdivian Forest ( Porter 1987) which extends from the 35 th to the 51 st parallel and is dominated by several species of Nothofagus Blume (Fagaceae) along with other characteristic trees and shrubs including Austrocedrus Florin and Boutelje and Fitzroya Benth. and Hook (Cupressaceae) , Gevuina Molina, Embothrium J. R. and G. Forst. and Lomatia R. Br. (Proteaceae) , Fuchsia L. ( Onagraceae ), Drimys J. R. and G. Forst. ( Winteraceae ), Berberis L ( Berberidaceae ), Myrceugenella Kausel (Myrtaceae) , and Chusquea Kunth (Bambusaceae) . Even further south, H. albifrons reaches the 55 th parallel in subantarctic Nothofagus woods on Tierra del Fuego and the adjacent mainland. So wide a geographic distribution, over 25 degrees of latitude and throughout a variety of subtropical desert and scrub communities, warm temperate wet forests, and cool to cold temperate rain forests, might seem remarkable if not unparalleled, but, in fact, is shared by many endemically Neantarctic taxa. For example, 14 other endemic ichneumonid species have the same geographical distribution as H. albifrons : Tromatobia sponsa (Haliday) , Echthropsis gayi (Spinola) , Dotocryptus bellicosus (Haliday) , Xiphonychidion cyanipennis (Brullé) , Anacis rubripes (Spinola) , Chilecryptus rhadinus (Porter) , C. tetracanthus (Spinola) , Neocryptopteryx metriuurus (Spinola) , Hyposoter ater (Brullé) , Alophophion chilensis (Spinola) , Mesochorus nequenensis Dasch , Syrphoctonus brevis (Dasch) , S. chilensis (Dasch) , and Chiloplites unicinctatus (Dalla Torre) ( Porter 1987, 1997). In this way, it may be seen that the Neantarctic biota not only is remarkably distinctive but also shows a high degree of coherence from one extreme to another over its vast geographic area, suggesting that its diverse elements have evolved for some time in contact with one another and in isolation from the Neotropical biota that occupies most other parts of South America.