Philochloenia Dejean, 1833

Philochloenia Dejean, 1833: 163 .

Pachycerus Guérin-Méneville, 1831: fig. 3 (non Schoenherr 1823). Type species: Pachycerus castaneipennis Guérin-Méneville, 1831 (designation: monotypy).

Anoplosiagum Blanchard, 1850: 119 . Type species: Melolontha rufipennis Fabricius, 1801 (designation: Lacordaire 1856: 264).

Aulanota Moser, 1924: 157, syn. nov. Type species: Aulanota sulcipennis Moser, 1924 (designation: monotypy), (now Philochloenia armata nom. nov.).

Hadrocerus Guérin-Méneville, 1838: 83 (replacement name for Pachycerus Guérin-Méneville), syn. nov.

Anomaloptera Burmeister, 1855: 22, nomen nudum.

Philochloenia – Frey 1967: 3 (synonymy with Plectris). — Smith & Evans 2005: 40 (synonymy with Dichelonyx). — Bousquet & Bouchard 2013: 39 (revalidated).

Anoplosiagum – Bousquet & Bouchard 2013: 39 (synonymy with Philochloenia).

Type species

Melolontha filitarsis Germar, 1824 (designation: Chevrolat: 735); junior synonym of Melolontha rufipennis Fabricius, 1801 (type species of Anoplosiagum).

Diagnosis

Clypeal ventral area large (Fig. 12 K); pronotal anterior and posterior margins not beaded; prosternum anteriorly concave (Fig. 12 K); elytral striae shallowly concave and punctate, five elytral striae present between internal margin and humerus, anterior and posterior margins not beaded and internal and posterointernal margins beaded; metatarsomere V with internoproximal spine-like setae.

Remarks

The genus has the pronotum with irregularly distributed large punctures. Some important interspecific variations are as follows: eye small (interocular area about four times wider than dorsal eye width, e.g., Philochloenia castaneipennis comb. nov., P. rufipennis comb. nov.) or large (interocular area about twice width of dorsal eye width, e.g., P. sulcatula (Blanchard, 1850) comb. nov.); antennae with eight (e.g., P. armata nom. nov.) or nine (e.g., P. castaneipennis comb. nov.) antennomeres; protibia with two (e.g., P. castaneipennis comb. nov.) or three (e.g., P. armata nom. nov.; P. rufipennis comb. nov.) external teeth; protibia with (e.g., P. rufipennis comb. nov.) or without (e.g., P. castaneipennis comb. nov., P. armata nom. nov.) a spur.

Philochloenia Dejean, 1833 was an available name with remarkable historical problems of misspelling and misapplication (see Smith & Evans 2005: 41). Bousquet & Bouchard (2013) discussed two type species designations of Philochloenia: Melolontha filitarsis Germar, 1824 (a synonym of Melolontha rufipennis, the type species of Anoplosiagum) according to Chevrolat (1847), which made Philochloenia the senior synonym of Anoplosiagum (current valid classification); and Melolontha elongata Fabricius, 1792 (now Dichelonyx elongatula Schoenherr, 1817) according to Smith & Evans (2005) which made Philochloenia a junior synonym of Dichelonyx Harris, 1827 (Dichelonychini) .

Another type species designation for Philochloenia was proposed by Desmarest (1860: 69), but the type species was fixed on an unavailable name: Philochloenia virescens Dejean, 1833, nomen nudum. Blanchard (1842, 1845, 1850) used this name to describe two species: Philochlaenia [sic] virescens Blanchard 1850: 122, a homonym of Philochlaenia [sic] virescens Blanchard, 1842 (type species of Chariodema; see Blanchard 1850: 117) and a synonym of Plectris ahena (Burmeister, 1855) (synonymy by Frey 1967: 114; correct name precedence by Evans 2003: 306).

The present study proposes the synonymy of Aulanota and Hadrocerus with Philochloenia .