Euphranta siruvani David, Hancock & Sankararaman, sp.n.

urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act: 166EE2CB-2CBF-4BCF-B978-8FD5A9576D7F

Description: Female: length of body, 6.59 mm (Fig. 1).

Head: frons fulvous with a medial fuscous band; three frontal setae and 1 orbital seta; 1 medial vertical and 1 lateral vertical seta present; occiput black (Fig. 2). Ocellar triangle black, without ocellar seta; postocellar seta present; postocular setae thin and black. Face fulvous without any markings; antenna fuscous; as long as face and with plumose arista; gena narrow with seta present.

Thorax: elongate (2.80 mm) and predominantly black (Fig. 3); scutum black with a broad, yellow, quadrate prescutellar patch and fuscous postpronotal lobe. Chaetotaxy: 2 scapular setae, 1 postpronotal seta, 1 postsutural supraalar, 1 intra-alar, 1 postalar, 1 dorsocentral, and 1 prescutellar acrostichal seta present. Scutellum yellow with 2 pairs of scutellar setae; anepisternum, katepisternum and anepimeron black with 2 anepisternal and single katepisternal and anepimeral setae; anatergite black with fine erect hairs; katatergite and subscutellum black; halter yellow (Fig. 5).

Legs: fore coxa fuscous; mid and hind coxae fulvous; fore femora pale fuscous on outer margin, with black spot on inner proximal margin; mid and hind femora black. Fore tibia slightly fuscous; mid and hind tibiae black; pretarsus fulvous (Fig. 6).

Wing: 5.37 mm long, predominantly hyaline with black transverse bands (Fig. 7); pterostigma black, cell r 1 with two hyaline wedges, black patch on Rs and base of cell br, discal band fused with radial band to form a V-shaped pattern; subapical band present and fused to broad apical patch, apex of cell r 4+5 hyaline, crossvein r-m placed beyond middle of cell dm.

Abdomen: 2.97 mm long, elongate oval, tergites 1–4 with a broad medial, subtriangular fulvous band, tergite 5 entirely black (Fig. 4).

Postabdomen: oviscape 1.23.mm long, conical, black with two fulvous spots laterobasally (Fig. 4); eversible membrane (1.19 mm long) with dentate spicules on distal end (Fig. 9); aculeus short (0.45 mm long) pointed with two preapical indentations and two pairs of preapical setae (Fig. 8); spermatheca (only one detected, exact number unknown) elongate-tubular and translucent (Fig. 10).

Type material: Holotype ♀, INDIA: Tamil Nadu, Coimbatore, Booluvampatti, Siruvani, 26.vii.2020, Sankararaman, H. (NBAIR).

Etymology: The species name is a noun in apposition and refers to the type locality.

Remarks: This species can be differentiated from other species of Euphranta by the presence of a V-shaped black band on the wing and prominent subapical band connected to the apical black patch. It belongs in the camelliae group (sensu Hancock and Drew, 2004) and appears closest to E. hainanensis (Zia) and E. sabahensis Hancock & Drew in having an incomplete subapical hyaline band and the medial brown band across r-m crossvein conspicuously broadened in anterior half of wing and with its basal margin distinctly oblique in cell dm (cf Hancock and Drew, 2004; Wang, 1998); it differs primarily in the lack of a complete hyaline transverse band between the r-m and dm-cu crossbands and the posteriorly abbreviated medial brown band.