Odontophotopsis acmaea Viereck

Pitts, James P., Wilson, Joseph S., Williams, Kevin A. & Boehme, Nicole F., 2009, Velvet ants (Hymenoptera: Mutillidae) of the Algodones sand dunes of California, USA, Zootaxa 2131, pp. 1-53 : 20

Odontophotopsis acmaea Viereck

Odontophotopsis acmaeus Viereck, 1904 . Amer. Ent. Soc., Trans. 30: 84. Male. Holotype data: Arizona, type no. 2304 (NMNH).

Odontophotopsis (Odontophotopsis) adonis acmaeus Schuster, 1958 . Ent. Amer. 37: 54. Male. Odontophotopsis (Odontophotopsis) grata Schuster (nec Melander, nec Schuster 1958 p. 53, 57, 58), 1958. Ent. Amer. 37: 55. Male. New Synonym.

Diagnosis of male. This species possesses the following combination of characters: the mandible is excised ventrally forming an angulate tooth, the mandible does not taper towards the apex, but instead is slightly dilated, the mesosternum only has one pair of large distinct spines that have a posterior face that is longitudinally sulcate and have an apex that is bifid, the metasternum is bidentate, and the pygidium is granulate and is not defined laterally by carinae. The genitalia of this species are similar to that of O. aufidia ( Fig. 9 ).

Female: Unknown.

Material examined. California, Imperial Co. : Algodones Dunes, Niland-Glamis Rd., 7.4 km NW Glamis, 6 males, 3–30.May.2008, S. Heydon and K. Lorenzen ( UCDC).

Distribution. Southern California and southwestern Arizona.

Remarks. This species is rare on the dunes, and is not endemic to the Algodones Sand Dunes.

Schuster (1958) placed this species as a subspecies of O. adonis (Fox) . C.E. Mickel later determined that it was not a subspecies of O. adonis ( Krombein et al., 1979) . The types of both species have been compared and we agree with Mickel.

The true identity of O. grata in Schuster (1958) has been a mystery; it appears in the key multiple times and obviously represents multiple species based on the characters used in the key. One of Schuster’s (1958) “ O. grata ’s” is a synonym of O. acmaea . The following information was used to make this deduction. The University of Minnesota possesses 14 specimens from Tucson, Arizona. Two of these specimens bear Schuster’s hand-written labels “ bifida ”, while one of them bears a white label “Group parva , keys to O. grata ” written by Schuster. These specimens are actually O. acmaea . Furthermore, O. acmaea keys out to Schuster’s (1958) O. grata on page 55. The genuine O. grata Melander keys out to Schuster’s O. grata referred to on pages 53, 57 and 58. Odontophotopsis acmaea and O. grata truly represent different species and this was another lapse on the part of Schuster. Odontophotopsis acmaea is a member of the O. parva speciesgroup along with O. arcuata , O. aufidia , and O. parva , while O. grata Melander is closely related to Sphaeropthalma difficilis ( Baker) based on similarities in morphology. The generic delimitations of Sphaeropthalma to take into account the true O. grata will be dealt with in a subsequent publication.

Figures

FIGURES 7 – 22. Dorsal view of genitalia, except Figs. 15, 17, 19, and 21 lateral view of cuspis. 7. Odontophotopsis ambigua; 8. O. arcuata; 9. O. aufidia; 10. O. biramosa; 11. O. clypeata; 12. O. inconspicua; 13. O. melicausa; 14 and 15. O. obscura; 16 and 17. O. parva; 18 and 19. O. quadrispinosa; 20 and 21 O. sonora; and 22. O. villosa.