Gyrophaena (Gyrophaena) furcata ( Motschulsky, 1858 )

Enuschenko, Ilya V. & Shavrin, Alexey V., 2021, On some species of Gyrophaenina Kraatz 1856 of Sri Lanka and India (Coleoptera: Staphylinidae: Aleocharinae: Homalotini), Zootaxa 5032 (3), pp. 331-356 : 336

Gyrophaena (Gyrophaena) furcata ( Motschulsky, 1858)

( Figs 17–20 )

Encephalus furcatus Motschulsky, 1858: 227 ; Motschulsky 1859: 51

Gyrophaena (s.str.) furcata: Bernhauer & Scheerpeltz 1926: 530 ; Cameron 1933: 219, 1939: 89

Type material examined: Lectotype (here designated) of Encephalus furcatus Motschulsky 1859 , 1 ♂ [dissected; specimen without left antennomeres 9–11 and left protarsus; labels as in Fig. 21 ]: ‘ Encephalus | furcatus Motsch. Ind. or.’, ‘Type’, [small round yellow label], ‘ LECTOTYPE Gyrophaena furcata Motschulsky, 1858 Enushchenko I.V. 2019 det.’ ( ZMM).

Redescription. Body length 2.05 mm. Body wide, robust ( Fig. 17 ); surface of forebody shiny, without reticulate microsculpture. Head and pronotum black; elytra and abdomen red-brown (apical portion of elytra blackish); antennomeres 5–11 dark brown; mouthparts, antennomeres 1–4 and legs yellow-brown. Head 1.5 times as wide as long, with two moderately large punctures in middle and a few distinct, sparse and fine punctures behind eyes; vertex impunctate. Basal antennomere elliptic, twice as long as wide, antennomere 2 1.6 times as long as wide, 3 slightly longer than 2, 1.4 times as long as wide, 4 transverse, as long as wide, 5–9 distinctly transverse, twice as wide as long, 10 1.2–1.3 times as wide as long, apical antennomere oblong, 1.4 times as long as wide, about twice as long as two preceding antennomeres. Pronotum strongly convex, transverse, 1.5 times as wide as long, with two median rows consisting of three large and deep punctures; basal portion of pronotum without punctation. Elytra slightly longer than pronotum, 1.6 times as wide as long, surface covered with moderately large tubercles (ca. 0.03 mm diam.), denser on shoulders, along suture and posterior margins. Abdomen almost parallel-sided, slightly tapering apically.

Male. Median lobe long, narrow, with subacute apex ( Fig. 18 ); apical projection of internal sac wider and longer than median lobe, with very long, spirally folded flagellum. Abdominal tergite VII with lateral irregular rows of small, oblong tubercles and very wide oval impression. Apical margin of abdominal tergite VIII with very deep and moderately wide excision ( Fig. 19 ). Apical margin of abdominal sternite VIII widely rounded ( Fig. 20 ).

Female unknown.

Comparative notes. Regarding the absence of microsculpture on the pronotum and the elytra, and general shape of the apical portion of the aedeagus, G. furcata is similar to G. livida Motschulsky, 1858 (see below), from which it can be distinguished by its significantly larger and wider body and different morphology of the aedeagus and male tergite VIII.

Distribution. India orientale; Sri Lanka ( Cameron 1939).

Remarks. Encephalus furcatus was originally described from “Indes orientales”.A male from ZMM was designated as the lectotype in order to fix the identity of the name. Bernhauer & Scheerpeltz (1926) and Cameron (1933, 1939) cited Encephalus furcatus as G. (s.str.) furcata . Among synonyms of G. furcata they listed G. humeralis Kraatz, 1859 and G. indica Motschulsky, 1858 . The senior author studied types of both E. furcatus and G. indica deposited in ZMM, and based on external and internal morphological differences revealed that they are different species.

Based on the general shape of the aedeagus and some details of the arrangement of pronotal punctures and elytral tubercles, G. (G.) furcata and G. (G.) livida (see below) somewhat resemble some species of the American genus Eumicrota Casey, 1906 (e.g. Eu. socia (Erichson, 1840) and Eu. spinosa Seevers, 1951 )), distributed in both American continents ( Ashe 1984, Newton 2019).

Figures

FIGURES 17–21. Gyrophaena furcata (holotype): 17–habitus, 18–aedeagus, lateral view, 19–male abdominal tergite VIII, dorsal view, 20–male abdominal sternite VIII, ventral view, 21–labels of the holotype. Scale bars: 1.0 mm (Fig. 17), 0.10 mm (Figs 18–20).