Bathyaulax, Szepligeti, 1906

Kaartinen, Riikka & Quicke, Donald L. J., 2007, A revision of the parasitic wasp genus Bathyaulax Szépligeti (Hymenoptera: Braconidae: Braconinae) from Africa and the Arabian Peninsula, Journal of Natural History 41 (1 - 4), pp. 125-212 : 148-149

Bathyaulax bifoIJeae sp. nov.

( Figure 38 )

Material examined

Holotype: Female ( CNCI): Tanzania, Dar es Salaam, Tanganyika , X-1961, G. Heinrich.

Description

Female: Length of body 18 mm, of fore wing 14 mm, of ovipositor 15 mm.

Antennae with more than 101 (apex broken) flagellomeres. Height of clypeus:intertentorial distance:tentorio-ocular distance51.0:3.0:2.9. Width of face:width of head:height of eye51.2:2.0:1.0. Height of face:width of face51.0:1.6. Sculpture on face pustulate, clypeus similar. Frons weakly depressed, smooth, with medial longitudal groove. POL:transverse diameter of posterior ocellus:shortest distance between posterior ocellus and eye51.1:1.0:3.2. Length of eye in dorsal view:distance of occiput and posterior margin of eye51.4:1.0.

Mesosoma approximately 1.7 times longer than maximally deep.

Fore wing: length of veins r:3-SR:SR151.0:2.4:3.8. Length of veins 2-SR:3-SR:rm51.0:2.1:1.2. Length of veins m-cu:2-M51.0:2.5. Length of veins 1-CU1:2- CU151.0:7.4. Shape of vein 1-SR+M nearly straight, weakly convex. Swelling in vein 3-CU1 1.8 times thicker than the other part of the vein.

Legs: Length of fore femur:tibia:tarsus52.1:2.3:1.0. Fore basitarsus 4.5 times longer than deep. Length of hind femur:tibia:tarsus52.3:3.3:1.0. Hind basitarsus 4.4 times longer than deep.

First metasomal tergite 1.6 times longer than wide; raised median area smooth with medial longitudinal groove, posterior margin strigated. Second tergite 1.7 times wider than long; medial and antero-medial triangular area raised and striate to aciculate. Third tergite 1.9 times wider than long; with transverse furrows on anterior and subposterior margins, anterior furrow medially aciculate to rugose and laterally strigated, and posterior margin strigated. Raised median area anteriorly strigose to rugose, with two depressions separated with a ridge. Antero-lateral areas smooth. Tergites four and five with strigated transverse furrows on anterior and subposterior margins, raised median areas aciculate and smooth antero-lateral areas surrounded by similar furrows. Tergites six to eight smooth.

Yellow except for the following which are black: antenna, frons, vertex, apex of mandibles and ovipositor sheets. Wings darkened with hyaline areas in fore wing below pterostigma and narrowly around vein r-m, and in hind wing in the base of the marginal cell. Pterostigma apical quarter darkened.

Etymology

Named because of the two large pits on third metasomal tergite.

Figures

Figures 35–38. Automontageș images of Bathyaulax species. (35) B. bicolor, frons. (36)–(37) B. buntikae, wing and metasomal tergites 2–3. (38) B. bifoυeae, metasomal tergites 2–3.