Scirtothrips Shull

Hoddle, Mark S. & Mound, Laurence A., 2003, The genus Scirtothrips in Australia (Insecta, Thysanoptera, Thripidae), Zootaxa 268, pp. 1-40 : 7

Scirtothrips Shull

Scirtothrips Shull, 1909: 222 . Type species S. ruthveni Shull , by monotypy.

Labiothrips Bhatti & Mound, 1994: 162 . Type species L. tenor Mound & Bhatti , by monotypy. Syn. n.

In describing the genus Labiothrips , the authors emphasised the unusually elongate mouth cone of the only known species, also the head of females with the occipital ridge almost confluent with posterior margin of the compound eyes. Because of these character states, the species was not compared to any member of the genus Scirtothrips . Moreover, at the time of that description the male of the species was not known. However, the males are now known to have the mouth cone rather shorter than that of females, and the postocular region distinctly longer. Moreover, the males have drepanae on the ninth tergite, as is common among Scirtothrips species. Given the variation in mouth cone length among the species of Scirtothrips recorded here, as well as the variation in other character states, there seems little point in segregating this one species to a separate genus. This is discussed further under S. tenor below. Anascirtothrips is another closely related genus (Mound & Wang, 2000), but the three known species all have a fringe of microtrichia on the sternites and the posterolateral setae on the mesonotum are close to the median setae. The second antennal segment lacks microtrichia (Mound & Wang, 2000), in contrast to Scirtothrips species, but the pronotum of some of the new species described below has setae on the posterior half in contrast to most members of the genus worldwide.