Euconnus (Euconnus) touko Hoshina, 2019

Jałoszyński, Paweł, 2022, Euconnus Thomson of Japan: redescriptions of species established by Reitter, Sharp and Franz, new synonyms, and summary of current state of knowledge (Coleoptera, Staphylinidae, Scydmaeninae), Zootaxa 5093 (1), pp. 1-37 : 29

Euconnus (Euconnus) touko Hoshina

Euconnus touko Hoshina, 2019a: 56 .

Euconnus (Euconnus) touko Hoshina ; here placed in Euconnus s. str.

Remarks. This species is known to occur on Shimokoshiki-jima, a small island off NW coast of Kyushu. It seems to be a member of the E. alesi species group. Three males are known, with the body length 1.47‒1.53, which overlaps with variability of E. kumejimensis (1.5‒1.7 mm), a species similar to E. alesi . Hoshina (2019a) concluded that E. touko differs from E. kumejimensis “in the median lobe of aedeagus sharply curved ventrally, but can be separated from it by having the median lobe of aedeagus with the apex at a ventro-apical corner, which is distinctly projected at middle and both corners of apical margin in ventral and dorsal views”, vs. E. kumejimensis having “the median lobe with the apex simply round in ventral and dorsal views”. The aedeagus illustrated for E. kumejimensis in Hoshina (2013) has a partly everted endophallus, and even the one later figured in Hoshina (2019a) is inconclusive, as it is also partly distorted and simplified. The aedeagus of E. touko illustrated in Hoshina (2019a) seems almost non-distorted, and it is not possible to compare shapes of the apical structures (entirely obscured and distorted by the erected endophallus in the holotype of E. kumejimensis ). Comparisons will be possible only when non-erected aedeagi of both species are illustrated, and the cephalic modification in males properly studied (preferably by scanning electron microscopy). Therefore, the status of E. touko remains unclear.

Hoshina (2019a) did not place this species in any subgenus. As all other members of the E. alesi group, E. touko belongs in Euconnus s. str.