Uranotaenia ( Uranotaenia ) sombooni Peyton & Klein, 1970

Gopalakrishnan, S., Natarajan, R., Shriram, A. N., Kumar, Ashwani & Rahi, Manju, 2025, Diversity of mosquitoes (Diptera: Culicidae) in Meghalaya State, India, with notes on seven new country records, Zootaxa 5706 (3), pp. 337-366 : 354-356

7. Uranotaenia ( Uranotaenia) sombooni Peyton & Klein, 1970

A total of 43 specimens ( 1 adult female with associated larval and pupal exuviae, along with 3 adult females collected resting in bushes near a ground pool, 4 larval exuviae and 33 larvae obtained from spring pools and stream margins in Baghmara, South Garo Hills and William Nagar, East Garo Hills, Meghalaya State ( 25.202270 – 25.202750 N; 90.612207 – 90.643363 E, 13–167 m a.s.l and 25.551785 N; 90.552685 E, 203 m a.s.l) on 26.XII.2023. Uranotaenia sombooni was identified by comparing adults and larvae with the descriptions and illustrations provided by Peyton & Klein (1970) and Rattanarithikul et al. (2006). Uranotaenia sombooni was originally described from Thailand.

Diagnosis. Uranotaenia sombooni closely resembles Ur. hebes Barraud, 1931a , Ur. prajimi Peyton & Rattanarithikul, 1970 and Ur. annandalei Barraud, 1926 . However, adults of Ur. sombooni can be distinguished from those of Ur. hebes by the absence of broad, flat, silvery translucent scales at the middle of the mesepimeron. They differ from the adults of Ur. annandalei by having a narrow ocular line composed of dull white scales and the presence of scales on the postpronotum. Uranotaenia prajimi differs from Ur. sombooni by having pale bluish decumbent scales on the head and a small lighter patch on the occiput; supraalar scales are mostly narrow, light to dark brown in colour and much less numerous.

Larval characteristics of Ur. sombooni are shown in Fig. 3g –l. The larva of Ur. sombooni , although closely resembling the larvae of Ur. annandalei and Ur. prajimi , can be distinguished by several key features: Ur. annandalei differs by having seta 1-A broad, flattened and inserted at the middle of the antennal shaft, Ur. prajimi differs in possessing a narrow, sclerotized plate on segment VIII that covers approximately 0.5 of the segment, lack of pigmentation on the siphon and having seta 1-S flattened and lanceolate. Uranotaenia hebes differs in that seta 1-C is spine-like and not bent at the apex; setae 1,2-P are without aciculae; and seta 1-A is single and long.