Pristiphora armata (Thomson, 1863)

Grearson, K. John & Liston, Andrew D., 2012, Review of seasonal polyphenism in the Symphyta (Hymenoptera), exemplified by Pristiphora leucopus (Hellén, 1948) (Tenthredinidae), Zootaxa 3502, pp. 72-88 : 75-76

Pristiphora armata

Type material examined:

Twelve extant specimens were examined that had been placed under the name Nematus armatus in Thomson’s collection at Lund. Four of them are male specimens and cannot be considered to be syntypes, because Thomson (1863) described only the female. One female specimen has all-black antennae and a lancet that resembles that of Pristiphora subopaca Lindqvist, 1955 . This cannot be a syntype, because Thomson described the antennae of N. armatus as reddish. The remaining seven specimens are all females which appeared, on the basis of external morphology, to be P. armata as described in this paper. One had been examined previously by E. Lindqvist and determined as P. crassicornis (Hartig, 1837) . Slides were made of the lancets of two specimens (KJG/X112 and X197). These resembled the lancets of P. armata as described below except that the serrulae were much shorter: even shorter than those of P. leucopus . The ratio of the lengths of the precalcars and postcalcars of serrulae 5–7 was only about 1.5 compared to 1.84 for the P. armata lancets measured in this study. No data is available regarding the plant associations of these Swedish specimens. The dates of collection are not clearly marked on any of the specimens and the localities indicated only as abbreviations. Research into these abbreviations ( Fitton 1982 & R. Danielsson pers. comm.) has revealed that the seven females which appeared to be P. armata were all collected in the locations mentioned in Thomson’s 1863 paper and are therefore syntypes.

The short serrulae of the two syntypes of which the lancets were examined may indicate that these are not conspecific with P. armata as currently understood. Examination of other adult specimens offered no support for the hypothesis that a further case of seasonal polyphenism is involved. We have decided not to designate a lectotype at present. In view of the large number of nominal taxa in the group and numerous taxonomic uncertainties, a lectotype designation should be undertaken during a revision of the group.