Bactrocera (Hemigymnodacus) diversa (Coquillett)

Drew, R. A. I., Romig, M. C. & Dorji, C., 2007, Records Of Dacine Fruit Flies And New Species Of Dacus (Diptera: Tephritidae) In Bhutan, Raffles Bulletin of Zoology 55 (1), pp. 1-21 : 7

Bactrocera (Hemigymnodacus) diversa (Coquillett)

Dacus diversus Coquillett, 1904: 139 . Syntypes in USNM. Dacus quadrifidus Hendel, 1928: 343 .

Dacus citronellae Kapoor & Katiyar, 1969: 123 .

Dacus (Hemigymnodacus) diversus – Hardy, 1973: 19. Bactrocera (Hemigymnodacus) diversa – Liang et al., 1993: 138. Bactrocera (Paratridacus) diversa – Norrbom et al., 1998: 99.

Material examined. – BHUTAN: 1 male, Purana Bastey, 30 Nov.2004, coll. Karma Namgyel, attracted to methyl eugenol. Specimen in NPPC .

Diagnosis. – Face entirely fulvous without dark markings; scutum entirely black, postpronotal lobes and notopleura yellow, mesopleural stripe almost reaching anterior npl. seta dorsally, broad parallel sided lateral postsutural vittae beginning with a small spot anterior to mesonotal suture and ending just behind ia. seta, a narrow medial longitudinal postsutural vitta present; setae: sc. 2; prsc. 2; ia. 1; p.sa. 1; a.sa. 1; mpl. 1; npl. 2; scp. 2; scutellum yellow except for narrow black basal band; legs with femora fulvous with dark fuscous to black subapical spots on outer surfaces of all femora (on the mid femora they cover approximately 1/2 the outer apical surface), fore and mid tibiae fulvous tending dark fuscous basally, hind tibiae dark fuscous, tarsal segments entirely fulvous; wings with cells bc and c colourless, microtrichia in outer corner of cell c only, narrow dark fuscous costal band confluent with R 2+3 and widening across apex of wing, medium width dark fuscous cubital streak present, supernumerary lobe strong and rounded; abdominal terga III- V red-brown with distinct ‘T’ patterns on terga III and IV consisting of a transverse black band across anterior margin of each tergum and a medium width medial longitudinal black band running to hind margin of each tergum, tergum V redbrown with large anterolateral dark fuscous to black corners and a narrow medial longitudinal dark fuscous to black band on anterior 1/2, a pair of red-brown oval shining spots on tergum V.

Attractant. – Methyl eugenol.

Distribution. – Sri Lanka, India, Nepal, China, Thailand. New record for Bhutan.

Hosts. – Flowers of a range of wild and commercial species of the Family Cucurbitaceae .

Remarks. – Bactrocera diversa (Coquillett) is a biologically unusual species of Dacinae in that it oviposits into flowers of its host, not fruit. It is readily distinguished by the following characters – face entirely fulvous (no dark patterns), scutum black with lateral and medial postsutural vittae, yellow spot anterior to mesonotal suture, wing with cells bc and c colourless, narrow costal band confluent with R 2+3, strong supernumerary lobe in males, legs with subapical dark spots on all femora, abdominal terga III-V with black ‘T’ patterns on all terga. It is a pest species in that it causes loss of flowers in commercial crops but does not have quarantine significance for export trade.