Cyrtonota bistigma ( Boheman, 1857 )

Sekerka, Lukáš, 2016, Taxonomic and nomenclatural changes in Cassidinae (Coleoptera: Chrysomelidae), Acta Entomologica Musei Nationalis Pragae 56 (1), pp. 275-344 : 326

Cyrtonota bistigma ( Boheman, 1857)

Mesomphalia bistigma Boheman, 1857: 52 (original description).

Mesomphalia smaragdina Boheman, 1857: 51 (original description), syn. nov.

Type localities. Original type locality of both taxa ‘Bolivia’ modified here to Bolivia, Department of Cochabamba, Territory of the Yuracaré people according to the additional information from the Register of the BMNH collections.

Type material examined. Mesomphalia bistigma : SYNTYPE: ♂, pinned, ‘Type [w, p, s, c, rf] || Bolivia [b, hw, s] || 46 | 76 [hw on underside of preceding label] || bistigma Bhn. | n. sp. [b, hw by Boheman, s] || Mesomphalia | bistigma, | Type Boh. [w, hw by Gahan, cb]’ ( BMNH).

Mesomphalia smaragdina : SYNTYPE: ♂, pinned, ‘Type [w, p, s, c, rf] || Bolivia [b, hw, s] || 46 | 76 [hw on underside of preceding label] || smaragdina | Bhn. n. sp. [b, hw by Boheman, s] || Mesomphalia | smaragdina | Type Boh. [w, hw by Gahan, cb]’ ( BMNH).

Remarks. Cyrtonota smaragdina is currently recognized as a distinct species of the Cyrtonota serinus Erichson, 1847 species-group, differing from related taxa in completely green explanate margin of elytra. I have recently studied type of C. smaragdina and in my opinion this taxon is conspefic with C. bistigma and represents only its extreme colour morph. Within the C. serinus species-group at least two species, C. bistigma and C. serinus itself, are quite polymorphic displaying several colour morphs. The typical specimens have a large yellow spot covering most of the explanate margin of elytra and each elytron with one or two small yellow spots. The two species can be easily separated by the punctation of elytra. In C. serinus the punctation is heterogeneous, in basal and apical parts of the disc finer and coarser in central part. Within the central part the punctation is further assorted in groups of various coarseness and densities while C. bistigma has uniformly punctate elytra. Cyrtonota smaragdina has identical punctation as C. bistigma and I synonymize it with the latter species. Both taxa were described in the same publication therefore I followed the Principle of the first reviser ( ICZN 1999: Article 24.2) and chose the name C. bistigma as the valid one because it was previously applied correctly.

BOHEMAN (1857) mentioned only ‘Bolivia’ as the type locality of C. bistigma and C. smaragdina . Types of both taxa are provided with the same accession number [18]46-76 referring to the Register of the BMNH collections. According to the register it is a multiple entry for various coleoptera and lepidoptera but all were collected in the ‘Territory of the Juacares Indians (north side of the Cordillera de Cochabamba)’. The locality most likely refer to the Territory of the Yuracaré people in the department of Cochabamba, Bolivia and hence the type locality is modeified here according to the new findings.

Cyrtonota smaragdina was over time recorded from various countries, however, these records belong either to C. bistigma or to C. serinus as both have a form with uniformly metallic margin of elytra. Therefore it is necessary to verify the respective voucher specimens to assign them to correct species. Although, it is quite likely that most records belong to C. serinus as that one is more common and frequently represented in collections. Therefore the distribution given here includes only published records of C. bistigma .

Distribution. Argentina: Missiones ( SPAETH 1914), Bolivia ( BOHEMAN 1857, BOROWIEC 2009c), Peru ( BOROWIEC 1996).