Androthrips Karny, 1911

Mound, Laurence A. & Minaei, Kambiz, 2007, Australian thrips of the Haplothrips lineage (Insecta: Thysanoptera), Journal of Natural History 41 (45 - 48), pp. 2919-2978 : 2936-2937

Androthrips Karny

Androthrips Karny 1911, p 560 . Type species: Mesothrips melastomae Zimmermann.

The species in this genus are considered ‘‘gall thrips’’ but they are probably kleptoparasites or predators rather than gall inducers. A total of 12 species have been named, but apart from a key to five species from India ( Ananthakrishnan and Sen 1980), most of these cannot be identified without re-examining original material. Of these named species, 11 are from the Oriental Region: four were described from India or Sri Lanka, four from Indonesia between Java and Papua, and one each from China, Taiwan, and the Philippines. The 12th species is based on a single male specimen from Cameroon that is presumed to have been lost ( Pitkin and Mound 1973).

Androthrips monsterae (Moulton)

Podothrips monsterae Moulton 1940, p 267 .

Androthrips monsterae (Moulton) Ritchie 1974, p 264 .

Described from two females and one male taken on the leaves of Monstera deliciosa at Koitaki, New Guinea, this species is here recorded from Australia for the first time. It has been taken from rolled leaf galls on five unrelated plants in the Northern Territory: Alyxia spicata (Apocynaceae) , Antidesma ghesembilla (Euphorbiaceae) and Smilax australis (Smilacaceae) at Darwin, Timonius timor (Rubiaceae) at Kakadu, and Choriceras tricorne (Euphorbiaceae) on the Cobourg Peninsula. The galls on these plants were induced by different undescribed species of the Teuchothrips complex. As indicated by Ritchie (1974), this species is similar to A. flavitibia Moulton , described on one female from northern India. It is also similar to A. kurosawai Priesner from the Philippines, although Reyes (1994) incorrectly stated that that species has only two sensoria on the third antennal segment whereas it actually has three (pers. comm. Richard zur Strassen, in litt. 2006). These three names possibly represent a single widespread species that has brown femora but yellow tibiae.

Recognition

Varying considerably in body size; body and femora brown, tibiae and tarsi yellow; antennal segments III–VI largely yellow; fore wings pale. Antennae eight-segmented, III with three sensoria, IV with four. Postocular setae longer than distance between eyes, weakly capitate. Pronotal am setae minute, four pairs of major setae long and capitate. Fore femur inner margin in both sexes with sub-basal spur and an irregular row of small tubercles ( Figure 4 ), this spur and also fore tarsal tooth largest in large individuals. Prosternal basantra present; mesopresternum almost complete medially. Metanotum with several small setae on anterior half. Fore wings constricted medially, with 5–10 duplicated cilia. Tergites II–VI with two pairs of sigmoid setae; tergite IX setae S1 weakly capitate and about 0.8 as long as tube. Male tergite IX S2 short and stout.

Apterygothrips Priesner

Apterygothrips Priesner 1933, p 1 . Type species: Apterygothrips haloxyli Priesner.

This genus was last redefined by zur Strassen (1966) to include eight species, but has been used subsequently to include any species resembling Haplothrips in general appearance but either lacking wings or with the wing-retaining setae reduced. Currently there are 41 species worldwide that are listed in this genus, but these are unlikely to represent a single lineage. Wing reduction and wing loss have clearly occurred more than once within the Haplothripini , and not always in closely related species, and Apterygothrips is presumably a polyphyletic assemblage. Furthermore, in this paper one fully apterous species is described in Haplothrips , a second new species is described in which the females are macropterous but the males micropterous, and the wing polymorphic species, Apterygothrips collyerae , is here transferred to Haplothrips .

Among the species currently placed in Apterygothrips there appears to be one speciesgroup of grass-living thrips, and the only known Australian member of the genus, A. australis , belongs to this group. A second Australian species of wingless Haplothripini has been studied from Kununurra in the north of Western Australia. This species was living on dead twigs, and apparently represents an undescribed apterous species that is related to the ‘‘ Apterygothrips ’’ species from dead wood in India ( Pitkin 1976). One of these Indian species, with two sensoria on the fourth antennal segment and the pterothorax exceptionally apteriform, was designated type species of Tamilthrips Bhatti (1995) , but the phylogenetic significance of such a genus based essentially on extreme wing loss remains open to question.

Figures

Figures 1–15. (1) Bagnalliella nigricoxae, holotype. (2) Dyothrips pallescens, pronotum. (3) Dolichothrips reuteri, mouth cone. (4) Androthrips monsterae, fore femora. (5) Priesneria peronis, antenna. (6) Karnyothrips melaleucus, head, pronotum, and fore legs. (7) Euoplothrips bagnalli, fore legs of small and large males. (8) Mesothrips jordani, head. (9) Haplothrips acaciae, head and pronotum. (10) H. anceps, head, pronotum, and right fore leg. (11) H. acaciae, pelta. (12) H. anceps pelta. (13) H. angusi pelta. (14) H. avius, head. (15) H. angusi, prosternites.