Ptychoptera xanthopleura Dvorak , Obona & Manko, 2023

Dvorak, Libor, Fogasova, Katarina, Obona, Jozef, Toeroek, Edina & Manko, Peter, 2023, Two new Ptychoptera Meigen, 1803 (Diptera, Ptychopteridae) from the Western Palaearctic, ZooKeys 1166, pp. 91-102 : 91

Ptychoptera xanthopleura Dvorak, Obona & Manko sp. nov.

Figs 1 , 2

Type material.

Holotype: 1 ♂: Azerbaijan, Qum, sidebrook/small tributary of the Ardavacaj (Ardavachay) River + wetland, 845 m a. s. l., 41°28'10.3"N, 46°55'57.2"E, 8.V.2019, leg. J. Oboňa & P. Manko. Paratypes: 2 ♂♂: Georgia, border of Imereti and Samtskhe-Javakheti regions, brook and spring, south slope of Zekari pass, 2 050 m a. s. l., 41°49'23"N, 42°51'09"E, 17.VII.2019, leg. G. Vinçon.

Description.

Male. Head: Frons, vertex, and occiput black with metallic blue shine, mouthparts including palpi pale yellow, scape and pedicel yellowish orange, antennal flagellomeres a somewhat darker, tending to pale brown.

Thorax: Scutum, paratergite, and mediotergite blackish with metallic blue shine; scutellum, pleurotergite, katepisternum, and katepimeron brownish black with lighter metallic blue shine; other parts yellow. Halteres yellow with light brown knob. Legs yellow except brown extreme apex of femora and tibiae, tarsi somewhat darkened.

Wing length 10 mm (holotype, Fig. 1c ). Wing almost hyaline, veins yellowish brown, distinct spots brownish black, forming more or less three stripes, at base of wing at the level of crossvein h, from C to Cu. Middle stripe touching vein C, running through cross-veins up to middle part of vein Cu, isolated spot before end of vein Cu. Isolated spot on around middle of R1. Third stripe consist of three large, almost touching spots: at the tip of R1 and fork of R2+3, one on fork vein R4+5 and one on fork vein M1+2. Small spot at the end of vein R3.

Abdomen: Tergum 1 dark shiny brown with yellow apex, sternum 1 yellow. Tergum 2 brown basally and apically, yellow in middle, sternum 2 yellow. Tergum 3 yellow basally, brown apically, sternum 3 yellow. Remaining terga and sterna brown, sternum 4 yellow basally. Auxiliar copulatory organ yellow.

Male genitalia (Fig. 2 ): Hypopygium almost 2 × as wide as long, widest in basal quarter, medially with very deep emargination. Epandrial claspers simple and long (length/width ratio ca. 5.8) and covered by long pale hairs, the longest hair up to 1.75 longer than width of epandrium. Apical stylus of gonostylus robust and rounded apically, secondary lobe long, reaching almost 0.75 of apical stylus length. Media lobe of basal lobe of gonostylus long and sharply pointed (saber-like); anterior lobe of basal lobe of gonostylus bulbous apically with several setae at extreme apex.

Female. The authors have an immature female which was sampled in Lesser Caucasus (Georgia, Kakheti region, Ilto river, above (N of) the Chart’ala village, 790 m a. s. l., 42°8'18"N, 45°7'32"E, 8.VII.2019, leg. P. Manko & G. Vinçon). The characters correspond to the above-described new species. However, its identity cannot be confirmed in this stage of ontogenesis/development and could be solved after collecting more specimens of the genus Ptychoptera from the Transcaucasia.

Etymology.

The name reflects predominantly yellow pleurae (Fig. 1b ), which are unique for the Western Palaearctic species.

Differential diagnosis.

According to the presence of auxiliary sexual organ and shining pleurae, P. xanthopleura sp. nov. belongs to the subgenus Ptychoptera Paraptychoptera and according to male genitalia and the maximum parsimonious tree based on 53 morphological characters (see Fig. 3 and Table 1 ), the nearest species is P. lacustris and belongs to the highly divergent monophyletic unit, the Ptychoptera lacustris group, including five species, P. xanthopleura sp. nov., P. lacustris , P. castor , P. helena , and P. pollux (Fig. 3 ). Ptychoptera xanthopleura sp. nov. is close to but differs from the most similar species P. lacustris mainly by having an almost completely yellow pleurae, the shape of the hypopygium (epandrial claspers, secondary lobe of gonostylus, and medial lobe of basal lobe of gonostylus).

Figures

Figure 1. Ptychoptera xanthopleura sp. nov. a habitus of male, lateral view b pleurae, lateral view c wing.

Figure 2. Ptychoptera xanthopleura sp. nov. terminalia a epandrium b paramere c aedeagal complex d gonostylus e hypandrium. Abbreviations: ECP = epandrial clasper, EL = epandrial lobe, EPI = epiproct, GBM = medial lobe of basal lobe of gonostylus, GAS = apical stylus of gonostylus, ALP = lateral ejaculatory process.

Figure 3. The maximum parsimonious tree based on 53 morphological characters. The characteristics are shown above branches. The parentheses show the maximum parsimony phylogeny bootstrap support value expressed as percentages. Support values under 40 are not shown.