Ammoplanellus (Ammoplanus) biskrensis, Boucïek, 2001

Boucïek, Zdenek, 2001, Palaearctic species of Ammoplanus (Hymenoptera: Sphecidae), Journal of Natural History 35, pp. 849-929 : 874-875

A. (Ammoplanus) biskrensis sp. n.

Male. Length of body 2.4 mm. Black; white are front sides of scapes, paraclypeal areas (except narrow black line above between tentorial pit and torulus) plus small triangles at inner orbits below, and mandibles; rest of antennae pale brown but proximal segments dorsally dark; legs dark but both ends of each tibia paler, all tarsi except darker tips. Wings hyaline with most venation, including pterostigma, very pale brownish.

Head broadest before middle, with sides above strongly rounded-converging. Frons suggesting slight cross-convexity in middle between mid ocellus and toruli; surface slightly dull, in dorsal half very ®nely longitudinally engraved-striat e merging with reticulation, in front of ocelli moderately shiny. Eyes below only slightly produced mesad, inner orbit in lower third almost straight. Toruli nearer to each other than to eyes. Clypeus raised into short median projection, this slightly upturning but not as sharp as in marathroicus . Anterior margin of sides of clypeus slightly arcuate, submedian tooth short, obtuse-angular. Labrum transverse, about 3 5 2, anteriorly almost truncate. Mandibles on unpigmented (brown) lower edge slightly widening towards base. Underside of head convex except for ¯at middle part which is almost smooth; sublaterally ®nely longitudinally striate, striae becoming coarser at the rather strong occipital carina; hypostomal carina (margin of oral fossa) strong, bordered by rather deep groove. Oral fossa almost V-shaped, about 1.5 times as broad as long, its sides diverging in right angle, fossa is only half as long (deep) as its distance from foramen magnum. Maxillary palpi moderately short, fourth segment (third from end) hardly 1.5 times as long as broad; labial palpi very short. Antenna slender, ¯agellum combined with pedicel about 1.35 times as long as width of head (105 5 78), hardly widening to apex, densely but very ®nely pubescent, its sensorial pits not distinct; scape 2.5 times as long as broad; pedicel 1.5 times as long as broad, much broader than following segments and about as long as penultimate segment of ¯agellum; ®rst ¯agellar segment slightly oblong, segments 2±10 each 1.5±1.6 times as long as broad, last antennal segment 2.7 times as long as broad, subacuminate.

Pronotum dorsally rounded, moderately shiny. Mesoscutum with same engraved reticulation as frons but meshes arranged more concentrically and surface shinier in middle. Scutellum shiny and smooth apart from scattered tiny punctures posteriorly. Propodeum slightly shiny, with very shallow and ®ne rugulose reticulation, median carina present in zig-zag form, otherwise dorsal surface with some ®ne crosscarinulae; surface not depressed diagonally in front of hind corners which are broadly rounded. Hind basitarsus in lateral view straight, on ventral side slightly broadly widened, on mesal side slightly concave and densely ®nely pilose in distal half, in dorsal view slightly emarginate before apex. Fore wing with cross-vein below marginal cell only very slightly curved.

Metasoma (®gure 79)

First sternite in its postpetiolar part on sides microscopically striate. Sternites 2±4 transversely depressed, saddle-like, otherwise 2 and 3 without distinctions, shiny and bare except for several ®ne hairs laterally at hind margin. Sternite 4 in middle fully as long as the second, in basal two-thirds shiny and bare, but median third of its hind margin acccurately produced and bearing a broad, transverse, ¯at, comblike row of rather long setae kinked at tips preceded by gradually shorter hairs; on either side of produced hind margin a slight depression. Sternite 5 posteriorly also with a rounded-angular projection with dark and slightly shorter and sparser setae. Sternite 6 much shorter than the ®fth, in middle shiny and bare but sublaterally bearing adpressed pale hairs. Aedeagus not seen except for tips of volsellae which are subapically expanded, margin between apex and expansion diagonal, slightly emarginate and bearing a row of hairs.

Female. Not known.

Comments. This species seems to belong in close relationship with A. marathroicus and insularis , but diOEers from them, as well as from other similar species with pale parastigma, in particular by the only slightly widened hind basitarsus and by the modi®cations of the apical sternites. The clypeus is almost of the same form as in insularis or kohlii , which may make the female di cult to separate from some other species.

Material examined. Algeria: Biskra,`Staz. no. 21’, HOLOTYPE male, 20 April to 2 May 1949 (A. Giordani-Soyka; deposited in MZL, Lausanne, Coll. Beaumont).

Distribution. Algeria.

Etymology. Name derived from Biskra, the type locality.