Genus Metolinus Cameron, 1920

Metolinus Cameron 1920: 147; Cameron 1932: 4 (characters; key to species of British India); Scheerpeltz 1933: 1298 (world catalog supplement); Shibata 1983: 68 (checklist of species of Japan); Herman 2001: 3703 (world catalog); Bordoni 2002: 337 (revision of oriental region; characters; key to species); Smetana 2004: 691 (Palearctic catalog); Bordoni 2005b: 539 (revision of Australia; characters; key to species); Bordoni 2007: 71 (catalog).

Type species.

Metoponcus leucocnemis Kraatz, fixed by subsequent designation by Blackwelder 1952: 241.

TDiagnosiss.

The genus Metolinus Cameron can be distinguished from all other genus level taxa within the tribe Xantholinini by the following characters: a) body nearly compressed, small to medium sized (3-8 mm), rarely larger (8-10 mm); b) head subquadrate or subrectangular (Fig. 2), often with microsculpture of microstriae (rarely of polygonal reticulum) and sparse medium punctures; c) frontal furrow often short or not obvious, ocular grooves distinct; d) penultimate segment of maxillary palpi and labial palpi distinctly longest, ultimate one slender and subaciculate (Fig. 3); e) pronotum with admedian and lateral row of punctures (Fig. 4); f) antesternal plate integrated (Fig. 5); g) superior line of hypomeron bending towards the prosternum before anterior angle of pronotum, but not joining with inferior line; h) tibiae with apical ctenidium, only protibiae with 2-3 rows of subapical ctenidia; i) aedeagus subelliptical, or lenticular, with symmetrical and thin parameres (Fig. 9); j) female genital segment with large sternite, devoid of supplementary sclerites (Fig. 10H).

Key to species of the genus Metolinus Cameron from China (cf. Bordoni 2002).