Hebrus (Hebrus) pusillus (Fallén, 1807)

Kment, Petr & Jindra, Zdeněk, 2005, New and interesting records of true bugs (Heteroptera) from Turkey, southeastern Europe, Near and Middle East, Acta Entomologica Musei Nationalis Pragae 45, pp. 3-16 : 4

Hebrus (Hebrus) pusillus (Fallén, 1807)

Revision of the material of H. pusillus from Turkey published by HOBERLANDT (1952) revealed that this material belongs at least to three species: H. montanus Kolenati, 1857 , H. pilipes Kanyukova, 1997 and ‘ H. pusillus ’. Hebrus pusillus is a widely distributed species with two valid Palaearctic subspecies: H. p. arabicus Linnavuori, 1971, which occurs in Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Yemen ( LINNAVUORI 1971, ANDERSEN 1995), and H. p. pusillus , which is widespread in Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia Hercegovina, Bulgaria, Byelorussia, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Great Britain, Greece, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Kazakhstan (European part), Latvia, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia (North, Central and South European Territory, East and West Siberia, Far East), Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey (both European and Asian part), Ukraine, Algeria, Canary Islands, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Iran, Israel, Lebanon and Syria ( ANDERSEN 1995; SAFAVI 1984, NIESER & MOUBAYED 1985, COX & COX 1995, BAENA 1996, KANYUKOVA 1997, PROTIĆ 1998, LINNAVUORI & HOSSEINI 2000). Hebrus pusillus seems to be a variable species in its external characters, and some of the previously described taxa, H. pusillus canariensis Poisson, 1954 and H. dupuisi Wagner, 1954 , were recently synonymized with H. p. pusillus ( BAENA 1996) . The Turkish H. pusillus differ somewhat from the typical specimens from central Europe. Two distinct Turkish forms could be distinguished, both of them having pale femora (dark brown in H. p. pusillus – see KANYUKOVA (1997)) and differing from H. montanus in possessing only short hairs on the inner margin of male hind tibiae and in different coloration. One of these ‘forms’ is macropterous, with reddish head and pronotum, ivory legs, and entirely white clavus. It is represented by specimens from Çak i t river near Abac i lar, Alacakilise, Armutlu, and Afrin river near Musabeyli ( HOBERLANDT 1952). The second form is submacropterous, with dark brown head and pronotum, pale brown legs and a brown clavus with a large white basal spot, and is represented by specimens from Gyaur da g lar i ( HOBERLANDT 1952). Both ‘forms’ appear to be rather similar to H. p. arabicus, which has e.g. the head and pronotum reddish brown, the clavus reddish brown with a milky base, and the antennae and legs yellowish-brown ( LINNAVUORI 1971). A comprehensive study of the morphological and genetical variability of H. pusillus from its entire distributional range may shed more light into these complicated relationships.