Neococcidencyrtus, Compere, 1928

Noyes, John Stuart, 2023, ENCYRTIDAE OF COSTA RICA (HYMENOPTERA: CHALCIDOIDEA), 4 Subfamily Encyrtinae: tribes Arrhenophagini, Habrolepidini, Cerapterocerini, Cheiloneurini, Trechnitini, Cercobelini, Polaszekiini, Protyndarichoidini, Gahaniellini and Syrphophagini (part), mainly primary parasitoids and hyperparasitoids of Coccoidea and Psylloidea (Hemiptera), Taxonomic Monographs on Neotropical Hymenoptera (Oxford, England) 2 (11), pp. 1-921 : 126-127

Genus NEOCOCCIDENCYRTUS Compere

Neococcidencyrtus Compere, 1928:209-212 . Type species: Neococcidencyrtus alula Compere , by original designation.

Xenocomys Blanchard, 1940:106 . Type species: Xenocomys chrysomphali Blanchard , by monotypy. Synonymy with Neococcidencyrtus by Annecke (1974:375).

Platylyca De Santis, 1972:58 . Type species: Platylyca quadriceps De Santis , by original designation and monotypy. Synonymy with Neococcidencyrtus by Noyes (1987:995).

Female. Overall length about 0.6-1.4mm.

Body slightly flattened; body often completely dark or with pale orange areas, or almost completely pale orange, darker areas often weakly to moderately metallic; paler specimens with a symmetrical dark pattern between top of scrobe and anterior ocellus, or a series of transverse dark and pale bands across scrobal area; mid tibia pale orange with knee orange-brown and a pair of incomplete, slightly oblique, dark brown bands at about 0.3X and 0.6X along its length (absent in some extra-limital species); fore wing hyaline or infuscate with a hyaline band after apex of venation, proximal margin more or less straight, distal margin broadly emarginate medially, band sometimes interrupted medially (especially in short-winged forms) apex sometime hyaline, marginal vein darker than other parts of venation; hind wing hyaline.

Head with frontovertex narrower than eye, in profile with tangent to frontovertex, between occipital margin and top of scrobes, forming an angle of 70-105° with face below top of scrobes; occipital margin indistinct, rounded, usually without a conspicuous seta behind each posterior ocellus, oval depression adjacent to eye margin behind posterior ocellus often present but indistinct; scrobes shallow, poorly defined; antenna with scape not broadened or hardly broadened, about 3.5-4.0X as long as broad; pedicel subconical about 1.5-2X as long as broad; funicle varying from all segments transverse to all longer than broad, but not more than 1.5X as long as broad; clava from about as long as funicle to slightly more than half as long as funicle, slightly wider than funicle, 3-segmented, outer suture often dorsally quite strongly oblique; sensory area small and at apex only, apex rounded; malar sulcus absent or present but usually inconspicuous; mandible basically tridentate, mostly from 1 sharp tooth and an upper, slightly concave truncation tooth to 1 sharp tooth and a broad, straight truncation with a very short acute tooth on the lower edge, with a socketed peg on its inner surface near the ventral margin; palp formula 4-3.

Thorax with pronotum hardly exposed behind head, its posterior margin fairly concave and slightly angular or notched medially; pronotum with imbricate-reticulate to polygonally reticulate sculpture that is slightly coarser than that in ocellar area, but generally of smaller mesh; mesoscutum without notaular lines, with polygonally reticulate sculpture that is slightly shallower than that on pronotum and generally of larger mesh size; axilla with shallow, transversely elongate, polygonally reticulate to imbricate-reticulate sculpture; scutellum dorsally with very fine, regular, polygonally reticulate sculpture that is clearly deeper and of much smaller mesh than sculpture on mesoscutum, scutellum with up to about 20 setae, a pair of long, slender, subapical bristle-like setae and another pair of shorter bristle-like setae proximad of these, side and apex completely smooth and shiny; mid tibial spur about as long as basitarsus; wings fully developed or sometimes reduced with fore wing not quite reaching half way along gaster; fully developed fore wing about 2.4X as long as broad; marginal vein at least about 3X as long as broad; as long as stigmal vein or longer; postmarginal vein short or absent; filum spinosum present.

Gaster with hypopygium not reaching apex; paratergites absent; syntergum slightly shorter than mid tibia with apex rounded; ovipositor mostly only slightly exserted, but occasionally very strongly exserted with exserted part as much as 1.5X as long as gaster; second valvifer with 2-9 subapical setae on second valvifer; gonostylus free.

Male. Overall length about 0.6-1.2mm.

Antenna with scape about a long as F1, about 2.5X as long as broad; funicle with 6 segments, all segments about 2.5-3X as long as broad with all segments clothed in whorls of long setae the longest of which is about 7-8 X as long as width of segment; clava entire, slightly shorter than F5-F6 combined; phallobase with digiti about 2X as long as broad, each with a single apical hook;

parameres developed, each with an apical and basal seta; aedeagus slender, about 10X as long as broad; apex acute or narrowly rounded, slightly less than half as long as mid tibia.

DISTRIBUTION. Virtually cosmopolitan: USA (California, South Carolina), Caribbean, central America, South America, southern Europe , Afrotropics, Middle East; central Asia .

HOSTS. Species of the genus have been recorded as primary parasitoids of various diaspidid scale insects ( Hemiptera : Diaspididae ) including Acutaspis paulista (Hempel) , Crenulaspidiotus lahillei (Lizer y Trelles) , Diaspis echinocacti (Bouché) , Epidiaspis zygophylli (Borchsenius) , Furchadaspis zamiae (Morgan) , Hemiberlesia rapax (Comstock) , Lepidosaphes Shimer , Melanaspis smilacis (Comstock) and Pudasis newsteadi (Leonardi) (see Noyes, 2019).

BIOCONTROL. In 1984, Neoccoccidencyrtus dryslidis Noyes was released in southern India from Brazil in an attempt to control Melanaspis smilacis on sugarcane ( CIBC, 1984) but no further information is available.

COMMENTS. Neococcidencyrtus is close to Paraschedius Mercet and the two are possibly synonymous. Sufficiently diverse material of the latter has not been available for study, and thus, for the present, the two genera are treated as distinct. Species currently placed in Paraschedius have the frontovertex wider than an eye in dorsal view and the head is yellow or pale orange without dark or metallic areas.

IDENTIFICATION. 27 species, including 7 described below as new, see: Noyes, 1987 (review and key to 18 species); Annecke, 1974 (review and key to 4 species); Myartseva, 1977 (6 species); Singh, 2008 (descriptions of two species).