Ceresium epilais Dillon & Dillon, 1952

Waqa-Sakiti, Hilda, Winder, Linton & Lingafelter, Steven W., 2015, Review of the genus Ceresium Newman, 1842 (Coleoptera, Cerambycidae) in Fiji, ZooKeys 532, pp. 15-53 : 19

Taxon classification Animalia Coleoptera Cerambycidae

Ceresium epilais Dillon & Dillon, 1952 Fig. 3

Ceresium epilais : Dillon and Dillon 1952: 23, Fiji: Viti Levu, Colo-i-Suva, holotype (BPBM).

Description.

Based on the holotype specimen (BPBM) and original description.Size 11.5 mm long, 3.1 mm wide at humeri; integument color brown to light brown (Fig. 3a). Head with shallow interantennal tubercle region, tubercles only slightly raised; punctate with very sparse ochraceous pubescence on tubercles and throughout frons; vertex and occiput with sparser ochraceous pubescence. Ochraceous pubescence denser around lower eye margins and around lower antennal insertions. Frons and frontoclypeal margin punctate with sparse, short and long, ochraceous hairs (Fig. 3b). Antennae long, extending beyond elytra by two antennomeres. Antennae with vestiture of short, dense, ochraceous setae (longer at apices of antennomeres). Antennomeres unspined and not expanded at apices; Antennomeres 6-11 damaged. Antennomere 3 subequal in length to scape (1.34 mm), Antennomeres 4 and 5 longer than scape, 5 being the longest (2.35 mm). Scape moderate in length (1.34 mm), clavate apically, extending to apical fourth of pronotum.

Pronotum broadly arcuate, widest across middle, and slightly wider than long; apex a little narrower than base. Disc densely punctuate with sparsely scattered pubescence elsewhere (Fig. 3c). Elytron with subparallel sides, with coarsely dense punctures and regularly spaced ochraceous pubescence. Elytral apex rounded to suture. Scutellum narrowly rounded, covered with dense, rugose (matted), ochraceous pubescence. Legs moderate in length (4.02 mm), femora distinctly but gradually clavate, hind femora extending apical margin of 5th ventrite.

Venter of abdomen and thorax with mostly sparse, pale ochraceous pubescence throughout, becoming most dense on episternites. Length of abdomen 3.64 mm. Prosternal process very narrow, barely separating and not extending to posterior margin of procoxae; gradually declivous, not expanded at apex, less than 1/15 width of procoxa. Procoxal cavities widely open posteriorly. Mesocoxae closed laterally to mesepimeron. Mesosternum not produced vertically, without anterior tubercle or sulcus; without lateral projections into mesocoxae (Fig. 3d). Apex of terminal ventrite broadly truncate apically without notch.

Remarks.

Superficially similar in form and color to Ceresium vacillans Dillon & Dillon, it is easily distinguished from that species by having the pronotum more rounded laterally and the elytra lacking glabrous patches. In the key characters, it is most similar to Ceresium lucidum Dillon & Dillon, but is distinguished by having the pronotum widest at middle (widest anteriorly in Ceresium lucidum ). This species is endemic to Fiji and known only from a single specimen collected on Viti Levu in June ( Dillon and Dillon 1952).