Biodiversity Data Journal :
Taxonomic paper
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A new species of Lygistorrhina Skuse (Diptera: Sciaroidea: Lygistorrhinidae) from South Africa
Corresponding author:
Academic editor: Torsten Dikow
Received: 27 Jul 2013 | Accepted: 14 Sep 2013 | Published: 16 Sep 2013
© 2013 Vladimir Blagoderov, Laszlo Papp, Heikki Hippa
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Citation:
Blagoderov V, Papp L, Hippa H (2013) A new species of Lygistorrhina Skuse (Diptera: Sciaroidea: Lygistorrhinidae) from South Africa. Biodiversity Data Journal 1: e962. https://doi.org/10.3897/BDJ.1.e962
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A new species of Lygistorrhina (Diptera, Sciaroidea, Lygistorrhinidae) from South Africa is described and a key for Afrotropical species of the genus is provided.
Taxonomy, new species, South Africa, Lygistorrhinidae
Lygistorrhinidae is a small family of fungus gnats (Diptera, Sciaroidea) represented by 15 genera and 41 species (http://sciaroidea.info/taxonomy/41555). The genus Lygistorrhina includes 21 species which are distributed worldwide in tropical and warm temperate regions. Twelve species of the subgenus Lygistorrhina (L.) are known from the Old World (Africa, Eastern Palaearctic, South East Asia, Australasia and Oceania). In addition, an undescribed species of the subgenus was reported from Mexico (
Descriptive terminology follows
Male. Measurements (mm). Head height 0.38, palpi 0.65, proboscis 1.05, antenna 0.9, thorax length 0.63, thorax height 0.71, metepisternum anterior margin 0.15, posterior margin 0.25; coxa 1 0.53; coxa 2 0.47; coxa 3 0.4; wing 1.9.
Colouration. Body, head and antennae entirely dark brownish-grey, almost black, halters yellowish, legs yellowish-brown.
Head (Fig.
L. austroafricana, photograph of holotype (HMNH - Diptera - FGO50909).
L. austroafricana, thorax and abdomen of a paratype (HMNH - Diptera - FGO50910), lateral, photograph. Scale: 0.5 mm.
L. austroafricana, wing of a paratype (HMNH - Diptera - FGO50910), photograph. Scale: 0.5 mm.
L. austroafricana, scape and basal flagellomeres of a paratype (HMNH - Diptera - FGO50910), photograph. Scale: 0.1 mm.
L. austroafricana, legs of a paratype (HMNH - Diptera - FGO50910), photograph. Scale: 0.1 mm.
L. austroafricana, male terminalia of a paratype (HMNH - Diptera - FGO50910), photograph.
Thorax, legs, and abdomen uniformly dark brown (Fig.
Wing (Fig.
Legs (Fig.
Terminalia (Figs
Female. Unknown.
The species differs from all Afrotropical species of Lygistorrhina in being smaller (wing length <2 mm), uniformly coloured very dark brownish-grey to black, and having shorter proboscis, which is at most 2x the length of coxa 1. Lygistorrhina austroafricana is most similar to L. edwardsina Grimaldi & Blagoderov, 2001 (
The specific epithet is an adjective in reference to the place of origin of the specimens.
South Africa: Eastern Cape.
Key to Afrotropical Lygistorrhina (based on |
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1 | Wings with distinct brown spots | 2 |
– | Wings hyaline or smoky, without distinct spots; antennae monochromatic, brown or yellow, at least the first four flagellomeres significantly longer than wide | 3 |
2 | Antennae flagellomeres 1–4 brown, 5 orange, 6 bright yellow, 7–11 brown, 12 bright yellow, 5–13-14 light brown; flagellomeres 1–4 twice as long as wide, 5–12 – approximately as long as wide. Gonostili slender, with apical tooth length twice its width. Côte d'Ivoire | L. hamoni Matile, 1996 |
– | Antennae yellow, with flagellomeres 1–3, 7–11 and 14 brown; flagellomeres with length equal to width, except the last two, which are significantly longer than wide. Gonostyli wide, with apical tooth as long as wide. Gabon, Central African Republic | L. legrandi Matile, 1990 |
3 | Wings uniformly brownish | 4 |
– | Wings hyaline or very faintly smoky at the apex | 5 |
4 | Antennae up to twice the length of the thorax and head together; proboscis yellow; subcosta short obliterated at apex, femora and tibiae brownish yellow, abdominal segments brown with yellowish white edges. Grande Comore | L. nassreddinei Matile, 1979 |
– | Antennae not longer than head and thorax together; proboscis brown; subcosta longer; ending on costa, femur and tibia dark brown; abdomen uniformly brown. Zaire | L. magna Matile, 1990 |
5 | Antennae entirely dark | 6 |
– | Antennae entirely yellow; wings hyaline; tibial spurs II equal and shorter than apical width of tibia; internal tibial spur III twice the width of tibia apex. Madagascar | L. sp. (Matile, 1990: 369) |
6 | Wings very weakly smoky at apex; thorax and abdomen brown to dark brown; proboscis 4x the length of coxa I; tergite 9 elongated, its apodeme thin, with narrow stem; internal tibial spur III 3x the width of tibia apex. Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Zaire | L. edwardsina Matile, 1990 |
– | Wings hyaline; body very dark brown, almost black, proboscis ~2x the length of coxa I; tergite 9 of male roughly rounded, its apodeme very wide and thick; internal tibial spur III 2.4x the width of tibia apex. South Africa | L. austroafricana sp. n. |
Authors are very grateful to all reviewers whose comments helped to improve the paper greatly.