Voconia bakeri, Castillo & Rédei & Weirauch, 2022

Castillo, Stephanie, Rédei, Dávid & Weirauch, Christiane, 2022, Pseudocetherinae (Hemiptera: Reduviidae) revisited: phylogeny and taxonomy of the lobe-headed bugs, European Journal of Taxonomy 788 (1), pp. 1-95 : 32-35

Voconia bakeri sp. nov.

urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:21FEECCD-754F-4DF8-815B-E18666CE9CE5

Figs 1–2 , 7 , 9 , 11 , 14 , 20

Diagnosis

This species most closely resembles two other dark-brown Philippine species, V. minima sp. nov. and V. nyx sp. nov., with yellow posteromedial yellow spots on the abducted corium, but is differentiated by the yellow patches on the dorsal laterotergites, the faint yellow spot on the anteromedial portion of the abducted corium, the presence of small paramedial lobes on the anteriad-directed process of the prosternum, and the stridulitrum being elongated anteriorly into a small protuberance. It specifically differs from V. minima sp. nov. by the uniformly dark legs and short labial segment I that does not reach the posteroventral eye margin and from V. nyx sp. nov. by the uniformly dark pronotum.

Etymology

Named after Austin Baker, a former colleague at UCR who provided support and insightful comments on this revision.

Type material

Holotype PHILIPPINES • ♂ (dissected pygophore and aedeagus in vial); Mindanao , Mts Or. , Mt Pomalihi, Gingoog City, 21 km W of Gingoog City; [8.81° N, 124.92° E]; elev. 800–1000 m; 16 Oct. 1965; H.M. Torrevillas leg.; light trap; USI: UCR_ENT 00073810 ; BPBM.

Description

Male ( Figs 7 , 9 )

BODY LENGTH. About 9.8 mm; macropterous.

COLORATION. Head: dark brown with paired pale patches adjacent to lateral ocellar margin; labium nearly as dark as head. Thorax: coloration as head; scutellum uniformly dark brown. Hemelytron (abducted): clavus dark reddish-brown, distal half yellow; corium dark reddish-brown with anteromedial, posteromedial, and distal yellow spots; membrane dark with pale V-shaped marking along R and M veins; membranal veins R and M proximally pale, remainder as membrane. Legs: dark brown. Abdomen: dark reddish-brown, almost black; dorsal laterotergites dark with yellow spots anteriorly.

INTEGUMENT AND VESTITURE. Head and pronotum: finely granulose with dense, long macrosetae interspersed among dense pubescence; interocular region with two pairs of macrosetae paramedially; antennifer with macroseta, base without lateral protuberance; morphologically ventral surface of labium with sparse, short macrosetae. Thorax: anterolateral angles of pronotal collar with macrosetae; scutellar lateral carinae with long setation. Hemelytron: corium with sparse long setation. Legs: posterior row of protuberances on mid and hind femora with three large and two small spines on distal half. Abdomen: ventral surface pubescent.

STRUCTURE. Head: elongate, about 1.2 times as long as wide; anteocular region about one quarter of head length, shorter than postocular region (measured to anterior margin of neck); postocular region in dorsal view about as long as eye, lateral margins in dorsal view gently rounded; pedicel about 1.2 times length of head width; maxillary plates ellipsoidal, adjacent to and longer than clypeus; apices of maxillary plates in dorsal view converging; clypeus in dorsal view wider than maxillary plates; clypeal apex round, narrowed; interocular glabrous markings anterolaterally curved, joined at interocular sulcus paramedially; interocular sulcus in dorsal view nearly straight; eye width in dorsal view about as wide as synthlipsis; eye reaching ventral head margin in lateral view; ventrolateral swelling of buccula without lateral protrusion that surpasses buccular margin, flat margin; labial segment I in lateral view straight, not reaching posteroventral eye margin; morphologically dorsal surface of labial segment II nearly straight, about 0.6 times length of segment I. Thorax: pronotal collar narrow medially with anterolateral angles short and flared laterally; anterior pronotal lobe about 0.7 times length of posterior pronotal lobe, lateral margins rounded; glabrous markings on pronotum thin and not deeply depressed; median apodeme depression of pronotum deep, elongated longitudinally; scutellar spine long, raised; anteriad-directed process of prosternum with paramedial lobes; anterior margin of stridulitrum projected into small protuberance; proepimeron with acute protuberance on posteroventral margin. Legs: fossula spongiosa present on fore and mid legs. Abdomen: anterior margin of terga weakly carinulate; terga II and III with paired prominent longitudinal carinae, reaching about two-thirds of tergum III. Pygophore ( Fig. 11 ): transverse bridge with rounded posterior margin; posterior region of ventral surface of pygophore in lateral view straight, not swollen; lateral pygophore margin with protuberance; posterior pygophore margin with clustered macrosetae on protuberance; parameres sinusoidal, apex tapered into squarely rounded tip. Aedeagus ( Fig. 14 ): endosoma almost entirely covered with spicules; apex of dorsal phallothecal sclerite tongue-shaped in dorsal view; basal plate extension about 4.3 times as long as wide.

Female

Unknown.

Distribution ( Fig. 20 )

This species is only known from the type locality in the Philippines. Based on the record of a Miridae Hahn, 1831 specimen with the same collection event, Mt Pomalihi is presumably in Mt Balatukan Range Natural Park. The type locality is also shared with V. isosceles sp. nov.

Remarks

The median apical process broke off during dissection ( Fig. 11 ). It was presumably short as is the case in all Pseudocetherinae , but it was not possible to determine if it was upright or bent posteriorly.

Figures

Fig. 1. Strict consensus tree resulting from equal weighting analysis. Jackknife values over 51 are reported for tree one of eight.

Fig. 2. Tree resulting from implied weighting analysis using K = 12 with characters unambiguously optimized. Symmetric resampling values over 51 are represented for trees obtained with K = 3, K = 6, K = 9, and K = 12 analyses. Characters and character states are described in pp. 11–22. Specimens not to scale.

Fig. 7. Dorsal habitus of holotypes of Voconia Stål, 1866 species with distribution: purple = Afrotropical region, green = Australasian region, pink = Oriental region. Scale bars = 3 mm.

Fig. 9. Lateral habitus of species of Voconia Stål, 1866. Scale bars = 3 mm.

Fig. 11. Pygophore of species of Gerbelius Distant, 1903 and Voconia Stål, 1866. Median apical process of Gerbelius typicus Distant, 1903 and V. bakeri sp. nov. damaged/missing. Scale bars = 0.5 mm.

Fig. 14. Aedeagus of species of Gerbelius Distant, 1903 and Voconia Stål, 1866. Scale bars = 0.5 mm.

Fig. 20. The distribution of species of Gerbelius Distant, 1903 and Voconia Stål, 1866 in Southeast Asia.