Culex (Culex) shoae Hamon & Ovazza

Harbach, Ralph E. & Wilkerson, Richard C., 2023, The insupportable validity of mosquito subspecies (Diptera: Culicidae) and their exclusion from culicid classification, Zootaxa 5303 (1), pp. 1-184 : 89-90

Culex (Culex) shoae Hamon & Ovazza

subspecies shoae Hamon & Ovazza, 1954 —original combination: Culex shoae . Distribution: Ethiopia ( Hamon & Ovazza 1954).

subspecies ugandae van Someren, 1967 —original combination: Culex (Culex) shoae ugandae . Distribution: Kenya, Uganda ( van Someren 1967).

The type forms of Cx. shoae and subspecies ugandae are only known from the original descriptions. The type locality of the typical form is an unspecified locality in the Shewa region (Romanized as Shoa) of central Ethiopia. Shewa lies in the Ethiopian Highlands, with elevations mainly above 1,500 m. The type locality of ugandae is Ngogwe, Uganda. Ngogwe is a municipality with an elevation of 1,200 m in the Central Region of the country. Van Someren (1967) indicated that larvae of ugandae were also found at Kakamega (elevation 1,535 m) in western Kenya. The immature stages of both forms have been found in the axils of wild banana plants, but larvae of ugandae have also been found in the axils of Colocasia .

Van Someren noted that although subspecies ugandae resembles the type form, all life stages exhibit “small but apparently constant differences”. The larva of ugandae is readily distinguished from the type form by having head seta 4-C with 2–4 branches, comb scales evenly fringed around the apex, the siphonal pecten with 8–10 spines, each with a coarse proximal denticle, and seta 1-X only slightly longer than the saddle. Seta 4-C is unusually large in the type form, with about 13 branches, the comb scales are unique in having lateral spicules that grade distally into blunt denticles and a blunt apex, the pecten consists of about 14 spines, the proximal spines have 1 or 2 denticles and the distal spines are simple, without denticles, and seta 1-X is 3 times as long as the saddle. Differences in the adult and pupa, which van Someren characterized as “only slight and perhaps unreliable”, include the following: In adults of subspecies ugandae the femora have small and inconspicuous knee spots (produced as narrow bands in the type form); in females the dark dorsal scaling of the hindfemur reaches the base of the femur (it does not reach the base in the type form); in males the outer division of the lateral plate of the phallosome has 6 denticles (3 in the type form) and seta d of the subapical lobe of the gonocoxite is stout and bristle-like (fine and hair-like in the type form); in the pupa seta 10-CT has 3 branches (6 branches in the type form), seta 11-CT is single or bifid (with 3 or 4 branches in the type form) and seta 5-VI is usually bifid but sometimes single (bifid in the type form). Differences in the male genitalia which van Someren did not notice include the differently shaped seta g of the subapical lobe (narrowed and slightly pointed distally in ugandae and broadly rounded apically in the type form), the ventrocaudal process of the outer division of the lateral plate is broad and somewhat duck-head shaped (narrow and more tooth-like in the type form) and the dorsal process of the outer division is broadly triangular in lateral view (more or less digiform in the type form).

There is a wide gap of much lower terrain between the high elevations of Ethiopia and Uganda / Kenya that include the type localities of the typical form and subspecies ugandae , respectively, and that area of lower elevation could be a barrier to gene flow and explain the allopatric separation and morphological distinctions exhibited by the two forms. Because the morphological differences between the adults, larvae and pupae of typical shoae and subspecies ugandae , coupled with their occurrence in separate geographical areas, provide credible evidence for the recognition of ugandae as a separate species, it is hereby formally raised to specific status: Culex (Culex) ugandae van Someren, 1967 . Culex ugandae is currently listed as a species in the Encyclopedia of Life.