Paloniella nodifrons, Akingbohungbe, 2003

Akingbohungbe, A. E., 2003, New species of Isometopinae (Hemiptera: Miridae) from the Ivory Coast and Yemen, Journal of Natural History 37 (23), pp. 2849-2862 : 2859-2862

Paloniella nodifrons sp. nov.

Male. Length 1.78. Maximum width across hemelytra 1.20. Head width across vertex 0.54; dorsal length 0.04; facial width 0.65; facial length 0.34. Anterior interocular space 0.30; posterior space 0.40. Dorsal width of eye 0.10; maximum width 0.21; height 0.28. Height of gena 0.02. Ocellus width 0.04; interocellar space 0.26. Maximum width of pronotum 1.02; median length 0.38. Scutellum length 0.62; width 0.53. Cuneus length 0.36; width 0.30. Rostrum 0.80. Antennae I 0.10; II 0.45; III 0.14; IV 0.12.

Ovate, strongly macropterous. Head strongly appressed, from above about 13.5× as broad as long; in front strongly transverse and ellipsoidal (figure 10), about 1.91× as broad as high. Vertex sharply carinate behind ocelli. Eyes apparently deep red (extensively bleached in specimen), moderately appressed and oval, glabrous. Ocelli moderately protuberant, colourless with surrounding annuli red; widely separated, about 6.5× width of each apart. Vertex, frons dark chocolate to reddish brown, finely rugose and distinctly punctate; dense with whitish erect somewhat sericeous hairs intermixed with fine reddish brown ones arising from aciculate punctures. Frons moderately tumid, apex with two pairs of nodular dark red to black spots; anterior margin convexly carinate, finely upturned. Antennae with segment I dark red, glabrous, cylindrical with broad indentation mesally; about 0.40× as thick as long. II at base about 1.25× as thick as I, more so (1.50×) subapically; densely microsculptured, yellow-brown with broad lateral reddish stripes; pubescent with erect hairs shorter than or subequal to segment thickness. III and IV fusiform, reddish brown to dark reddish.

Pronotum subcampanulate, about 2.68× as broad as long; disk tumidly raised, strongly inclined forwards; prominently explanate laterally, distinctly bisinuate posteriorly. Pubescent with some whitish somewhat sericeous hairs and abundant decumbent reddish brown hairs intermixed with fine erect ones arising from aciculate punctures. Mesoscutum, scutellum similarly tumidly raised.

Dorsum generally dark chocolate to reddish brown, finely rugose, distinctly punctate; embolium, ectal area of cuneus golden yellow and impunctate. Mesoscutum, scutellum largely rubbed. Hemelytra dense with semi-reclining and semi-erect golden to reddish brown hairs intermixed with finer erect ones arising from aciculate punctures; embolium in addition with some dark red bristles; membrane golden, biareolate, glabrous.

Venter generally dark red, propleura pale to yellow brown. Pleura distinctly punctate. Legs largely reddish brown, tibiae somewhat paler or golden with weakly contrasting reddish stripes. Rostrum with segment I, base of III, apex of IV red to dark red; otherwise pale to golden yellow; extending slightly beyond hind coxae.

Dorsal habitus illustrated in figure 9; genitalia illustrated in figures 17–19.

Female. Unknown.

Comments

The affinities of this new species are with Paloniella latifrons Akingbohungbe from Nigeria and P. mutabilis Akingbohungbe from Tanzania. It is, however, relatively smaller than either of these two species. Besides, it can be readily separated from them based on the pubescence on the second segment of the antenna which are ordinary hairs that are either shorter than or subequal to the thickness of the segment; these contrast with the bristle-like hairs that are at least twice as long as segment thickness in these other species. The frons in the new species also bears two pairs of somewhat nodular spots arranged along the middle towards the apex, but these spots are absent in P. latifrons and P. mutabilis . The head in addition is less strongly transverse, being less than twice as broad as high in contrast to these two species. Rather unfortunately, the specimen suffered some defects and some of the legs went missing in the process of dissecting for the genitalia. However, the observations recorded on them had already been made.

H  : male, Ivory Coast: Kiriao , 17 October 1973, Linnavuori (LC) .