Ablabesmyia Johannsen

Niitsuma, Hiromi & Tang, Hongqu, 2019, Taxonomic review of Ablabesmyia Johannsen (Diptera: Chironomidae: Tanypodinae) from Oriental China, with descriptions of six new species, Zootaxa 4564 (1), pp. 248-270 : 250

Subgenus Ablabesmyia Johannsen

Ablabesmyia Johannsen, 1905: 135 ; Roback 1971: 365, 1985: 178; Niitsuma 2013: 481.

Roback (1985) divided the subgenus Ablabesmyia into five species groups based on the adult male and larval features of North American species: A. (A.) rhamphe, A. (A.) monilis , A. (A.) simpsoni , A. (A.) mallochi and A. (A.) aspera groups. In Japanese species A. (A.) amamisimplex Sasa and A. (A.) jogancornua Sasa et Okazawa , however, the grouping based on the adult is contradicted with that of the larva ( Niitsuma 2013). The males of both the species belong to the A. (A.) simpsoni group because the dorsal lobe has an apical brush and a well-developed lateral lobe is present in the aedeagal complex, while their larvae do not belong to any of the groups since the maxillary palp is sub-divided into three short and one long segments. Roback (l.c. p. 158) stated, “I have not seen a 3 short, 1 long segmented palpus except in early instars of A. mallochi and A. aspera , though it is not unlikely that such a formation and others will be found when the world fauna of Ablabesmyia is better known.”