Veraphis gansuanus, Jałoszyński, Paweł, 2013

Jałoszyński, Paweł, 2013, Three new species of Eutheiini (Coleoptera, Staphylinidae, Scydmaeninae) from China, Zootaxa 3609 (5), pp. 495-503 : 498-500

Veraphis gansuanus sp. n.

( Figs. 4, 6, 8–9 , 13 )

Type material. Holotype: CHINA (Gansu Prov.): ♂, two labels: " CHINA: S-Gansu [ CH 12-12] / W-Qinling Shan, 128 km NW Longnan / Lazikou pass, S-side, Laolong valley / 34°08'14''N, 103°51'57''E, 2300 m, / S-slope with pine and spruce forest, litter sifted, 3.VIII.2012, M. Schülke" [white, printed]; " VERAPHIS \ gansuanus m. \ det. P. Jałoszyński, '12 \ HOLOTYPUS " [red, printed] (cMS). Paratype (♀): three labels; " CHINA: S-Gansu [ CH 12-11] / W-Qinling Shan, 125 km NW / Longnan, Lazikou pass, S-side / Zhuli valley, 34°07'57''N, 103°56'15''E, 2260 m," [white, printed], "N-slope, mixed forest with oak / and pine near creek, litter and / dead wood sifted, 3.VIII.2012, / leg. M. Schülke" [white, printed], " VERAPHIS \ gansuanus m. \ det. P. Jałoszyński, '12 \ PARATYPUS " [yellow, printed] (cPJ).

Diagnosis. Male protrochanter with subrectangular apex; aedeagus in ventral view with distinctly asymmetrical, broader than long, deeply and narrowly emarginate apical part and distinct internal armature located sub-apically; in lateral view apex of median lobe evenly rounded and curved ventrally. Females unremarkable, on the basis of morphological characters can be identified only by direct comparison to males, preferably when collected together.

Description. BL 1.58 mm. Body of male ( Fig. 4 ) weakly convex, slender, moderately dark brown, covered with yellowish vestiture, legs and antennae only minimally lighter.

Head broadest at large strongly convex eyes, HL 0.18 mm, HW 0.28 mm; vertex with distinct pair of median pits, each prolonged by shallow longitudinal groove running anterad and becoming gradually shallower and broader to disappear at posterior margins of barely marked supraantennal tubercles; frons flattened, clypeus steeply declining anterad, flattened; sides of vertex and frons confluent and convex. Punctures on head dorsum fine and indistinct; setae short, sparse and suberect. Antennae slender, with indistinctly demarcated club composed of antennomeres IX–XI, AnL 0.63 mm, antennomere I nearly 3 × as long as broad; II distinctly shorter and slightly narrower than I, 2.2 × as long as broad; III nearly as long as broad; IV–VII each elongate (V longest); VII slightly transverse and distinctly shorter than VII; IX about as long as broad; X slightly transverse; XI only about 1.3 × as long as broad.

Pronotum nearly subquadrate, broadest near anterior fourth; PL 0.38 mm, PW 0.40 mm, anterior margin broadly and evenly rounded; lateral margins strongly rounded in anterior third, behind middle indistinctly constricted and in posterior fourth distinctly convergent towards obtuse and blunt hind angles; posterior margin shallowly bisinuate. Pronotal base with distinct, deep and nearly circular median ante-basal pit and lateral pair of elongate impressions running along lateral pronotal margins. Punctures on pronotal disc large and dense but shallow and diffused, in middle separated by spaces subequal to puncture diameters, punctures gradually becoming finer towards pronotal margins. Setae short and sparse, suberect.

Elytra more convex than pronotum, oval, broadest slightly anterior to middle; EL 0.78 mm, EW 0.58 mm, EI 1.35; humeral calli well-marked, elongate. Punctures on median part of elytra similar to those on pronotal disc but slightly smaller and yet more diffused; setae similar to those on pronotum. Hind wings well developed.

Legs moderately long and slender; protrochanter with distinctly angulate margin, with sub-rectangular apex, protibia with sub-apical fin-like projection ( Fig. 6 ).

Metaventrite with median impression nearly as long as ventrite, margins of impression diffused.

Aedeagus ( Figs. 8–9 ) slender; AeL 0.33 mm; in ventral view median lobe distinctly constricted in sub-median region, with asymmetrical apical part bearing deep and narrow median apical emargination; in lateral view, apex of median lobe folded ventrally; internal structures distinct, located in sub-apical region; parameres exceeding half length of median lobe.

Female. Similar to male, except for non-modified fore legs. BL 1.65 mm; HL 0.18 mm, HW 0.28 mm, AnL 0.58 mm; PL 0.40 mm, PW 0.43 mm; EL 0.83 mm, EW 0.60 mm, EI 1.38.

Distribution. China, Gansu Prov. ( Fig. 13 ).

Etymology. After the Chinese province Gansu.

Remarks. Veraphis gansuanus is most similar to its Chinese congener V. qinghaiensis and the V. japonicus species group known from Japan and China. It shares with V. qinghaiensis a similar subrectangular male protrochanter, but clearly differs in much stouter aedeagus strongly constricted in the sub-apical region and a different shape of its apical region. Veraphis gansuanus shares with the japonicus group (i.e., V. m o d e s t u s, V . japonicus (K. Sawada, 1962), V. odaigaharensis Jałoszyński & Hoshina 2005, V. tottoriensis Jałoszyński & Hoshina 2005 and V. h i s a m a t s u i Jałoszyński & Hoshina 2005) a similar shape of the aedeagus, with abruptly demarcated apical part, but differs in the shape of male protrochanter, which in nearly all species belonging to that group is rounded, not angulate. The only exception is V. h i s a m a t s u i with indistinctly angulate protrochanter, similar to that of V. gansuanus , but apical parts of aedeagi of these two species are clearly different (short, asymmetrical and with a narrow median emargination in V. gansuanus vs. long, symmetrical and with a straight apical margin in V. h i s a m a t s u i). Differences between V. gansuanus and all other Palaearctic species of Veraphis are also distinct: the new species differs from the V. irkutensis species group and from all subspecies of V. engelmarki Franz, 1971 in the apex of aedeagus without setae and the antennomere XI without the sub-apical cavity; from the V. s a w a d a i species group in the angulate male protrochanter and the aedeagus with short (and not long) and abruptly (and not gradually) demarcated apical part; and from V. s pi n os u s and V. calcarifer in the male protrochanter without pointed apical projection.

Figures

FIGURES 4 – 11. Veraphis gansuanus sp. n. (4, 6, 8 – 9) and V. assingi sp. n. (5, 7, 10 – 11). 4 – 5 ― dorsal habitus of holotype males; 6 – 7 ― right fore leg in posterior view; 8 – 11 ― aedeagus in ventral (8, 10) and lateral (9, 11) views.

FIGURES 12 – 14. Distribution of Eutheiini in China. 12 ― genus Eutheia (a ― E. laolongiana; b ― E. nujianglisuana; c ― E. puetzi; d ― E. sculpturata); 13 ― genus Ve ra ph i s (a ― V. assingi; b ― V. calcarifer; c ― V. gansuanus; d ― V. m o de s t u s; e ― V. qinghaiensis; f ― V. s p i n o s u s); 14 ― all Eutheiini.