AMENIINAE (Kurahashi, 1989)

Colless, D. H., 1998, Morphometrics in the genus Amenia and revisionary notes on the Australian Ameniinae (Diptera: Calliphoridae), with the description of eight new species, Records of the Australian Museum 50 (1), pp. 85-123 : 95-96

Subfamily AMENIINAE

The diagnosis given by Crosskey (1965) will serve generally to identify Ameniinae :

Calliphoridae with usually metallic coloration; posterior spiracle with cluster of strong hairs on anterior lappet; thorax with weak but distinct development of a subscutellum; head almost always with conspicuous facial carina; postabdomen of female not forming an extensible telescopic ovipositor. And, as secondary attributes: eyes bare; parafacials bare; arista long-plumose; subalar bulla bare; lateral declivity of postalar callus densely long haired; prosternum strongly haired (except in some Paramenia spp.); prostigmatic seta present; prothoracic spiracle dark brown; stem-vein of wing bare; veinM bent angularly forwards; hind tibia with strong apical pv bristle (except in Parameniini ); abdominal stemites very broadand exposed, infemale almostalways with spinous setae; male terminalia as in Calliphorinae (several other attributes mentioned by Crosskey no longer apply).

To these may be added the presence of infrasquamal setulae on the thoracic mediotergite and the (often) swollen gular area of the head. The last may not always be obvious, but (except in Amenia spp.) it is normally detectable. It appears to be absent in other Calliphoridae . The shape of the posterior spiracle is also distinctive; the lappets are roughly equal in area and the posterior one has a smoothly rounded anterior margin and no setulae on the disc (except in some Catapicephala spp.). However, the most useful subfamily attribute is still the presence of a tuft of long, dark hairs with fine, "wavy" tips on the anterior lappet of the spiracle. Other calliphorids-e.g., Chrysomya-may have a rather similar condition, but the hairs are more normal, not converging into an anterior tuft, and they extend across the posterior lappet as well. Species of Paraplatytropesa are a problem, since they may have the lappet hairs weakly, and sometimes not at all, developed; but such specimens may be recognised by the metallic colour, small size, vibrissae level with epistome, parallel inner vertical bristles, and the very prominent swelling of the gular region of the head.

The mainly Oriental genus Catapicephala Macquart is now placed in the Ameniinae ( Kurahashi, 1989) (see also below, under Parameniini ). One species occurs in western New Guinea but none inAustralia. Catapicephala spp. have the anterior lappet of the posterior spiracle more or less uniformly setose, the length of the hairs varying somewhat between species and sexes. In one female examined, of C. ingens (Walker), the hairs were quite sparse and short, but a male of C. splendens had them more resembling the ameniine norm, albeit rather inconspicuous. However, the shape of the lappets conforms closely to the rather distinctive form typical of Ameniinae (see above). The subscutellum is also quite well developed, more so, in fact, than in most ameniines. All in all, then, I see no reason to exclude the genus from that subfamily.

I shall refer below to two additional metric characters not employed in Part 1: (a) the relative distance of the bend of wing-vein M to the wing-margin, formalised as the M-bend index: the minimum distance from the bend of Mj+2 to the margin, divided by the distance from the mid-point of the bend to the junction with i-m; (b) the antennal segment ratio, which is the ratio of the length of antennal segment 3 to that of segment 2, both measured from the junction of those segments on the mesad surface.

Additional species described below necessitate some pruning of Crosskey's (1965) key to genera, to remove attributes that no longer hold good. The following version will serve to identify the vast majority of specimens, if in reasonable condition.