Homa insignis Distant, 1908 (status revived)

(Figs 1 G-I; 6)

Homa insignis Distant, 1908: 400, fig. 248. — Matsumura 1931: 80, fig. 4. — McAtee 1934: 102, plate 3, figs 26, 27. — Mahmood 1967: plate 10, figs 2a-2e.

Empoasca (Homa) insignis – Metcalf 1968: 441.

Homa insignis – Dworakowska 1969: 487 (placed as junior synonym of H. haematoptila in error); 1994a: 6. — Xu et al. 2022: 181 (placed as a junior synonym of H. haematoptila in error).

DISTRIBUTION. — Sri Lanka, Thailand and China (new records) and India (?), see Remarks below.

MATERIAL EXAMINED. — Lectotype. Sri Lanka • ♂ (see Remarks); Sri Lanka: Peradeniya; V.1905; Distant coll.; NHMUK 013588831. India • 1 ♀; Mishmi Hills; Delei River; 1700’; 7.II.1935; M. Steele; NHM.

Thailand • 10 ♂; Nakhon Nayok Khao Yai NP; behind football field; 14°24.619’N, 101°22.778’E; 770 m a.s.l.; malaise trap; 5-12. VII.2006; Pong Sandao leg. T142; INHS, QSBG .

China • 1 ♂; Yunnan, Jinghong, Wild Elephant Valley; 29.IV- 4.V.2017, coll. Ye Xu; NWAFU .

REMARKS

This species was described from an unknown number of specimens (syntypic) with the following data: “ Ceylon; Peradeniya (Green)”. Mahmood (1967) redescribed the species based on “the type” (and therefore is deemed to have designated the lectotype by inference, see ICZN 1999, Article 74.6). Although the male genitalia of the lectotype are now missing they were figured by Mahmood (1967) and although with certain inaccuracies, Mahmood’s figures are sufficient to identify the genus (see Qin et al. 2011: 31). Identification of Homa insignis from Mahmood’s poor figures is more problematical but the Asian specimens examined here (see Fig. 6) are correctly identified considering that Mahmood’s aedeagus figure is not lateral (as originally stated) but ventral, and the basal processes (as originally described and figured), are absent and possibly mistaken for the gonoduct. The specimen from India (Mishmi Hills), being female, is only tentatively identified as this species (and hence the question mark under Distribution), but the reference to the species from Lombok (Indonesia) by Jacobi (1941: 312) cannot be considered reliable. Dworakowska (1969) placed this species as a junior synonym of H. haematoptila but later (Dworakowska 1994a) treated H. insignis as a valid species but this was apparently overlooked by Xu et al. (2022) who treated it still as a senior synonym of H. insignis, without justification (see Remarks under H. haematoptila).

Figures of the type by McAtee (1934, pl. 3, fig. 26) indicate that it was probably he that made the wing mount (Fig. 1I) and presumably corrected the poorly preserved jugal lobe (Fig. 1H) in his drawing of the hind wing. The latter defect was probably that referred to by Matsumura (1932) in the following way: “After studying the somewhat defect hind wing of this species in the British Museum, the author found that the genus belongs to the group Empoascaria, the first and second veins being uniting, and at the point of the uniting a cross-vein sent straightly downwardly, the third vein simple, stronger till the cross-vein; the cross-vein of the elytron at the dorsum straight”.