Tetrameringia aethiopica Stuckenberg, 1973

Barraclough, D. A., 2002, A new species of Tetrameringia McAlpine (Diptera: Schizophora: Clusiidae) from Malawi, the third species from theAfrotropical Region, African Invertebrates 43, pp. 5-10 : 6-7

Tetrameringia aethiopica Stuckenberg, 1973

Tetrameringia aethiopica Stuckenberg, 1973: 581 ; 1980: 636.

Additional material examined (all in NMSA, unless otherwise indicated): SOUTH AFRICA: Mpumalanga: 1 male, Lone Creek Falls, 11 km W. Sabi, 2530 BB, 3.xii.1976, R. Miller. KwaZulu-Natal : 1 female, 75 km WSW. Estcourt, Cathedral Pks [sic] For. Sta. , Rainbow Gorge , 10–18.xii.1979, S. & J. Peck, Podocarp For, dung cup traps ( CNC) ; 1 male, Town Bush, Pietermaritzburg, xii.1976, R. Miller , Malaise trap ; 1 female, Tshwala Benyoni Farm, Merrivale , 1.xii.1994, B. Stuckenberg, at light in house. Eastern Cape : 2 females, Hogsback , 3226DB, 13–16.xii.1985, J. & B. Londt, forest & forest margins. Western Cape : 1 male, Dewale [sic] Forest , 13.i.1983, R. M. Miller .

Discussion: This species appears to be widespread in South Africa, and is now recorded from the KwaZulu-Natal midlands, afromontane forest in Mpumalanga (Lone Creek Falls) and the Eastern and Western Cape as far south as Knysna. The Knysna locality extends the species’ range almost 400 km to the southwest, and the Lone Creek Falls locality, an additional 500 km to the northeast. It is likely that aethiopica occurs in suitably forested intervening areas, but is probably absent from afromontane forest in the KwaZulu-Natal Drakensberg.

Stuckenberg (1973: 584) suggested that a series of specimens from the Katberg in the Eastern Cape Province may represent a distinct variety or subspecies of aethiopica , as they differed from the KwaZulu-Natal type material in having bicolorous pleura and uni-colorous mid and hind femora. Examination of the additional material above convinces me that this is not the case, and that aethiopica exhibits considerable intraspecific variation in the colour of the thoracic pleuron and the mid and hind legs. Some of the specimens examined have only the propleural area (including the region around the anterior spiracle), the sternopleuron and the hypopleuron contrastingly paler, whilst in other specimens the pale colour is restricted to the propleural area and the ventral sections of the sternopleuron and hypopleuron. In addition, infuscation of the mid and hind femora may occur in specimens with a bicoloured pleuron, unlike the Katberg material. Other colour variation worth noting is that in some specimens the hind tibia is entirely dark, and the first abdominal tergite is sometimes yellow-brown in females, with the pale ground colour extending medially onto the anterior section of T 2 in the Lone Creek Falls female.

I have examined the terminalia of the Knysna male; the shape and proportions of the surstylus and tergite 9 are closely similar to those figured for the paratype from the type locality ( Stuckenberg 1973: 581).