Bellatheta species

Assing, Volker, 2021, New species, synonymies, combinations, and records of micropterous Athetini from China (Coleoptera: Staphylinidae: Aleocharinae), Beiträge Zur Entomologie = Contributions to Entomology 71 (1), pp. 87-101 : 89

Checklist of Bellatheta species recorded from China

Atheta of the Athetini . Nevertheless, Oroekklina was subsequently placed in the subtribe Bolitocharina of the tribe Homalotini ( SCHÜLKE & SMETANA 2015) . Three additional species were described in, or transferred to, Oroekklina by ASSING (2002, 2009) and PACE (2004), all of them micropterous and from China (Sichuan and Yunnan provinces). A revision of all the species previously included in Oroekklina , including the type species, revealed that the tarsal formula is not 4, 4, 5 as indicated in the original description, but 4, 5, 5. Thus, no principal difference remains distinguishing Oroekklina from Bellatheta , whose monophyly is constituted particularly by the synapomorpic structure of the median lobe of the aedeagus (ventral process deeply bifid), a condition also shared by the species previously in Oroekklina . As a consequence, Oroekklina is placed in synonymy with the senior name Bellatheta , resulting in four new combinations (see checklist below).

Including the new species described below, 15 species of Bellatheta , seven of them micropterous, are currently known from China. The micropterous representatives of the genus are distributed in West China, from Qinghai and Gansu in the north to Yunnan in the south ( Map 1 ), with four of the species locally endemic in Yunnan, two in Sichuan, and one in Qilian Shan (Qinghai, Gansu) .

The species are listed alphabetically. Species recorded from Taiwan are not included.

The literature references are abbreviated as follows: A02 = ASSING (2002); A05 = ASSING (2009); A09 = ASSING (2009); A11 = ASSING (2011); App = ASSING (present paper); P93 = PACE (1993); P98a = PACE (1998a); P99 = PACE (1999); P04 = PACE (2004); P11a = PACE (2011a).

Micropterous species are marked with a “+”. Species of doubtful generic assignment are marked with an asterisk (“*”).

Figures

Map 1: Distributions of micropterous Bellatheta species in China:B. qiliana (black circles); B. proiecta (black diamond); B. daxuensis (white circles); B. aucticeps (black triangle); B. smetanai (white triangles); B. excaecata (white diamond); B. diacangica (black star).