Plangia graminea

Hemp, Claudia, Heller, Klaus-Gerhard, Warchałowska-Śliwa, Elżbieta, Grzywacz, Beata & Hemp, Andreas, 2015, Review of the Plangia graminea (Serville) complex and the description of new Plangia species from East Africa (Orthoptera: Phaneropteridae, Phaneropterinae) with data on habitat, bioacoustics, and chromosomes, Organisms Diversity & Evolution (New York, N. Y.) 15 (3), pp. 471-488 : 475

Types of P. graminea and related taxa

The Natural History Museum London holds the holotype of Plangia compressa (Walker, 1869) . Unfortunately, most of the body is missing including the genitalia. The thorax is badly damaged as well and only the two hind legs, the tegmina and wings, the pronotum, and the head remained. Comparing the spination of the hind legs, the shape and measurements of the tegmina, the shape of the pronotum and the head including the fastigium verticis, and comparing the characters with specimens originating from the Cape Province of South Africa (including specimens from the Naturkunde Museum Vienna holding specimens from the series of Walker on which P. graminea was described), no differences at all could be observed. Therefore, we here synonymize P. compressa with P. graminea . The designation of a neotype for P. graminea is difficult since following the rules the type of Plangia natalensis , synonymized with P. graminea , should be the new neotype. However, also the whereabouts of this type is unclear. Walker described P. natalensis 1869 on a specimen coming from the collection of the German W. Gueinzius, and the type thus remained in this collection. Eventually, parts of the collection were given to the Stettin collection, but most material was handed to various other collections ( Horn & Kahle 1935 –37). The collection of the Natural History Museum London holds numerous specimens of Plangia collected all over southern Africa. The habitus and morphological characters are all very homogenous for specimens originating from the Cape Province of South Africa, suggesting that only one Plangia species is present in this area. An exception is seen from specimens being collected in the Drakensberg area of KwaZulu Natal, South Africa. Those probably belong to another species of Plangia . Therefore, it cannot be excluded that P. natalensis is a good species and since the type of P. graminea is lost and the type of P. natalensis is missing, no decision can be made on the status of the South African species of Plangia . Regarding aforementioned difficulties of defining P. graminea , we decided to compare East African specimens with specimens originating from the type locality of P. graminea and thus delimitating the species on base of those specimens. A neotype for P. graminea will be designat- ed from the series of Walker stored in the Vienna collection.