Bohumiljania humboldti Jolivet, Verma & Mille 2005

Reid, C. A. M. & Beatson, M., 2011, Revision of the New Caledonian endemic genus Bohumiljania Monrós (Coleoptera: Chrysomelidae: Spilopyrinae), Zootaxa 3000, pp. 1-43 : 10-11

Bohumiljania humboldti Jolivet, Verma & Mille 2005

( Figs 6, 14, 40, 48, 56, 72, 76, 110, 120, 130, 137, 155)

Material examined

Type : Paratype: female/ Mt Humboldt 12.ii.2005, P. Jolivet leg./ allotype / Bohumiljania humboldti n. sp. det P. H. Jolivet 2005 / Museum Paris don. nr 1329/ MHNP EC1781 / paratype / ( MHNP) .

Description (based on the single female examined)

Length: female 15mm; body elongate parallel-sided, length c. 3x width, length c. 3.8x height, profile flat at elytral base with flat pronotum. Head dark brown with appendages orange (labrum, palpi, antennomeres 1–3), pronotum and scutellum reddish-brown, elytra olive-green with broadly orange lateral margins, venter dark orange except mesanepisternum and metepimeron brown, legs orange with base of tibiae and apices of tarsomeres 3 and 5 brown; apices of mandibles and edge of buccal cavity at antennal sockets black. Head and pronotal punctures each armed with recumbent short white setae. Head microreticulate, pronotum and elytra shining, without microreticulation.

Head: distinctly pubescent, short recumbent setae dense throughout; puncturation dense (intervals <diameters) and fine throughout; midline of head shallowly depressed and frontoclypeal suture with pair of shallow depressions; eyes large and laterally prominent, with small internal canthus, separated by c. 4.2x eye width (female); temples short, c. 0.1x length eye, not posteriorly truncate; gena short, c. 0.25x eye length (female), genal lobe ratio 1.2; antennae situated at anterior of head, in laterally directed sockets, c. 5x socket diameter apart; antennomeres 4–11 missing, first and third approximately equally long, second c. 0.65x first; labrum not densely setose, with 1 pair of prominent setae on disc and 2 pairs at sides; mentum transversely rectangular, width c. 2x median length, without prominent anterior angles; apical maxillary palpomere elongate, with narrow tip, preapical as long as apical (female); gula with shallow transverse ridges.

Thorax: pronotum distinctly pubescent, with dense recumbent silvery setae, sparser and shorter at middle and absent from circular impunctate area anterior to middle, hypomeron finely and densely pubescent throughout; pronotum slightly convex at sides, slightly narrowed anteriorly, anterior truncate, base broadly convex; pronotal width c. 1.2x length; anterior angles slightly laterally produced, c. 75°, posterior angles strongly produced, c. 45°; anterior not margined except near angles, sides and base margined; sides of disc broadly shallowly depressed in basal half, with feeble swelling between depression and lateral margin; pronotal punctures fine and dense (intervals about equal to diameters), sparser on disc and absent from a circular area on anterior of disc, fine and dense on hypomeron; prosternum punctured and pubescent throughout, including process; prosternal process elongate, entirely medially grooved, concave sides broadly expanded to strongly bilobed apex, angle between lobes Vshaped, c. 90°; scutellum punctured and pubescent at base, almost quadrate with rounded apex; elytron glabrous except short erect setae at apical margin, elongate groove between humerus and epipleuron, finely and sparsely punctured throughout, with shallow grooves between punctures, except apical tenth strigose-rugose with punctures more or less obliterated; upper margin epipleuron reaching angle of humerus at base but obliterated by rugose sculpture in apical tenth; mesoventrite median process gradually elevated to bilobed apex, angle between lobes Vshaped, c. 100°; wing fully developed, with faint yellowish medial fleck; metaventrite shining and glabrous medially, sides densely pubescent and finely punctured, apical lobe elevated, laterally margined and medially depressed; metepisternum densely finely punctured and pubescent; 1 short spur on protibia, 2 on remainder; tarsi narrow, length first metatarsomere 2.8x width; length second metatarsomere 1.4x width.

Abdomen: ventrites I and II entirely fused; ventrites shallowly microreticulate, densely and finely punctured throughout, V with longer more erect setae; basal half ventrite 1 laterally keeled, II–V without lateral keels; apex female ventrite V medially truncate.

Genitalia: apex female sternite VIII sinuate with median concavity, basal apodeme large and quadrate, apex not expanded; gonostylus elongate-oval, not fused to gonocoxite; spermatheca falcate, swollen in basal half, duct twisted at junction with spermatheca, short and thick; rectal kotpresse similar to B. xaracuu ( Fig. 148), with dense elongate ventral spinule patch and strips of dense spinules dorsally.

Notes

There is considerable confusion in the literature concerning the identity of B. humboldti , which we attempt to disentangle below. One problem with our discussion is that at time of preparation of this manuscript only a single specimen, a female paratype, had been lodged in MNHN, Paris, despite the claim that the holotype was lodged there ( Jolivet et al. 2005). This paratype lacks antennomeres 4–11 .

From the evidence of the accompanying photographs, the description of B. humboldti provided by Jolivet et al. (2005) is based on several species, including at least B. humboldti , and B. mandjelia , probably also B. aoupinie and B. xanthogramma . Our description is based on the topotypic paratype loaned to us, which we have cleaned and remounted on a point ( Fig 6). A similar specimen has been illustrated twice ( Jolivet et al. 2005, Fig. 3; Jolivet & Verma 2009, Plate 41), associated with two widely separated localities, Mount Humboldt and Mandjelia respectively. The same specimen cannot have been captured at both Mount Humboldt and Mandjelia. Given the similarity of the specimen loaned to us, from Mount Humboldt, to that illustrated twice by Jolivet and co-authors, we consider the caption to Jolivet & Verma 2009, plate 41, to be incorrect. Perhaps the caption was intended for a different photograph, which was mislaid.

Bohumiljania humboldti is confined to Mount Humboldt, where it has only been collected at high altitude, between the refuge at 1380m and the summit at 1610m ( Jolivet et al. 2005). The hostplant is Myrtastrum rufopunctatum (Myrtaceae) . The late instar larva is free-living and yellowish-brown, with dark brown head, pronotal sclerite and legs (described from photograph in Jolivet et al. 2005, fig. 6). Adults and larvae were collected in February, presumably by beating.