Hydropsyche obscura Navás 1928

Bemmoussat-Dekkak, Soumya, Abdellaoui-Hassaine, Karima, Sartori, Michel, Morse, John C. & Zamora-Muñoz, Carmen, 2021, Larval Taxonomy and Distribution of Genus Hydropsyche (Trichoptera: Hydropsychidae) in Northwestern Algeria, Zootaxa 4915 (4), pp. 481-505 : 486

Hydropsyche obscura Navás 1928

( Fig. 4 )

Material examined: Chouly Beni Ghazli Wadi ( CH 0): 11 larvae ( UTA, UGS), including 2 larvae, 28.x.2014 ; 4 larvae, 22.xii.2014 ; 2 larvae, 21.vi.2015; and 3 larvae, 17.iii.2017.

Description: Body length of fifth-instar larva ranging from 11.50 mm to 12.00 mm. Pronotum and head dark ( Figs 4A, 4B ) and frontoclypeal apotome with two light anterolateral spots; oral and aboral spots absent ( Fig. 4B ; Table 2). Lateral parts of submentum short and wide ( Fig. 4C ); prosternites pigmented ( Fig. 4D ; Table 2).

Distribution and ecology: It is a North African endemic species; it is restricted to Algeria (in Great Kabylia) and Morocco (in the high Atlas and the Rif). It is considered as a species of high altitudes and cold springs ( Ajakane 1988; Bouzidi 1989) and appears more associated with streams and small bodies of clean water ( Hajji et al. 2013; Hajji 2017). Sekhi et al. (2016) recently reported it for Algeria (Kabylia). During our survey, larvae of this species were collected in two high altitude sites KH1 and CH 0 (at 854 and 1065 m a.s.l., respectively), where the water temperatures are 13–17.3 ° C. The species exhibits a rheophilic character since it was found in fast current velocity (1.2–1.75 m /s) and cohabited with H. siltalai and H. fezana .

Figures

FIGURE 4. Hydropsyche obscura Navás 1928. 4A, head and thorax, dorsal; 4B, cephalic capsule, dorsal; 4C, cephalic capsule, ventral; 4D, posterior prosternites, ventral. [scale bar = 1 mm].