Nesodaphne marianensis, Usinger, 1946

Usinger, Robert L., 1946, Hemiptera Heteroptera of Guam, Insects of Guam II, Honolulu, Hawaii: Bernice P. Bishop Museum, Bulletin 189, pp. 11-103 : 66-67

63. Nesodaphne marianensis , new species.

Elongate-oval, densely pubescent, the second antenna! segment with two white rings on basal fourth.

Head three fourths as long as broad, 23: 31; abruptly narrowed in front of the eyes, the width of head at this point, one third of total head width, 10.5: 31 interocular space about one third as wide as head, 10: 31; inner margins of eyes deeply concave anteriorly. Clypeus strongly convex, widened apically, beset with numerous long hairs, depressed at base. Juga.strongly convex. Vertex carinate posteriorly. Rostrum reaching a little beyond middle of mesosternum, the first segment reaching about to base of head; proportion of segments, 14: 11: 9: 14. Antennae over twice as long as head and pronotum together, 119: 54; proportion of segments, 27: 52: 23: 17.

Pronotum half again as long as head, 32: 23; two thirds as long as broad, 32: 45; strongly and regularly narrowed anteriorly, the width at anterior collar one third as great as across humeri, 16: 45. Collar one fourth as long as wide, 4: 16, feebly convex and briefly emarginate at middle. Pronotal disk moderately convex, slightly depressed behind poorly defined callosities, and beset with ill-defined punctures and long, erect hairs. Disk with 10 clumps of stiffer, black hairs regularly placed, two near middle, six across posterior disk at and between humeri and two behind this near middle.

Scutellum scarcely broader than long, 23: 21; convex with a broad depression at middle of base, the disk with poorly defined punctures, long pale hairs, and two clumps of long black hairs.

Hemelytra over twice as long as width of pronotum, 100: 45, impunctate, sparsely clothed with erect pale hairs and more densely clothed with appressed white hairs, the actual surface covered with a soft tomentum. Commissure of clavus longer than scutellum, 24:21, the clavus moderately convex. Cerium subflattened, the embolar region depressed and costal margin a little reflexed, moderately arcuate. Cerium less than three times as long as its greatest width, 62: 23. Cuneus twice as long as wide, 21:10, its outer margin feebly arcuate.

Color pale testaceous and brownish, the head pale with fulvous on vertex. Rostrum brown at apex. Antennae pale with an oblique brown fascia at base and a broad fulvous area at apex of first segment. Second segment brown with short white pubescence and with two pale rings on basal fourth, one at middle, and one at apex; third segment dark brown except for pale ring at apex, and fourth segment entirely brown. Pronotum fulvous with paler anterior margin of collar, disks of callosities, humeri, and narrow hind margin. Scutellum brownish with a white tomentum, the apex white. Clavus brown with white tomentose spots basally and apically. Cerium with numerous pale spots occupying most of basal half, the costal area interrupted with only two brown areas. Apical half more broadly brown. Cuneus brown at middle and at apex. Membrane dark brown at base, infumate apically, with white on apical angle of areole. Under surface largely pale. Legs pale with median and subapical brown rings on femora, two brown rings on anterior tibiae, three on middle tibiae, and four on posterior tibiae. Tarsi brown.

Length 4.83 mm.; width (pronotum) 1.5 mm., (hemelytra) 1.76 mm.

Holotype male, Fullaway (1200). This specimen was kindly loaned from the U. S. National Museum by R. I. Sailer. It was discovered among miscellaneous Oriental mirids by T. Y. Hsiao who referred it to me as an undescribed species.

N. marianensis is closely allied to knowlesi Kirkaldy , which I have seen from Fiji (Kirkaldy's type), Samoa (Swezey and Zimmerman) and Tahiti (J. M. Clements). N. knowlesi has a smoother head which is less abruptly narrowed in front of the eyes; the rostrum is slightly longer, reaching beyond the middle of the mesosternum; the second antenna! segment has only a single basal pale ring; and the hemelytra are more extensively brown basally.

It will be necessary to use the name Tinginotum Kirkaldy (Ent. Soc. London, Trans., 263, 1902) in place of Nesodaphne Kirkaldy (Linn. Soc. N. S. Wales, Proc. 33: 380, 1908) if a study of the genotypes shows the two to be congeneric.