Austrocyphon bifidus, Zwick, Peter, 2013

Zwick, Peter, 2013, Australian Marsh Beetles (Coleoptera: Scirtidae) 4. Two new genera, Austrocyphon and Tasmanocyphon, Zootaxa 3706 (1), pp. 1-74 : 16-18

Austrocyphon bifidus , sp. n.

( Figs. 24–27 )

Type material. TAS: Holotype: ♂, Cradle Mtn Tasmania Carter & Lea ( SAMA). Paratypes: 1 ♂ with the same data as the holotype; 2 ♂, L. Margaret Tasmania J.Armstrong; both specimens were originally glued onto one card together with several ♂ of A. bidens and several unidentified ♀♀ ( QMSB T169578; AMS K249517). 5 ♂, TAS Cradle Valley Cradle Mountain -Lake St Clair N Pk 19/1/00, C.H.S.Watts ( SAMA). 2 ♂, same data, originally glued onto the same collective card together with more than 20 other specimens, including A. doctus and Cyphon (s.l.) frater ( SAMA).

Habitus. BL 1.8–2.1mm, BL/BW about 2.0. Dark brown, no elytral pattern.

Male. T9 caudolateral hooks strongly curved and sharply tipped. Plate bare, a weakly sclerotized short tongue extending back beyond lateral hooks, caudal margin finely irregularly serrate. S9 oval, almost unsclerotized, caudal margin with broad shallow notch, sparsely pilose.

Penis broadest caudally, bifid, with two slender caudolateral lobes. No flanges. Membranous foramen almost filled by the wide trigonium whose apex is spinulose. Centema distinct, narrow.

Tegmen a thin wide bracket ending in thin, acutely pointed parameres.

Female. Not known with certainty, apparently not distinctive.

Etymology. Latin bifidus , divided in two, in reference to the bifid penis tip.

Note. Austrocyphon bifidus and A. bidens , sp. n. are endemic in Tasmania and the smallest Tasmanian species. They cannot be distinguished by habitus and females cannot be identified. J. Armstrong took both species plus A. doctus and Cyphon (s.l.) frater at Lake Margaret, mounted them in groups on cards and labelled all of them as syntypes of a single intended new species.

Figures

FIGURES 24 – 31. Austrocyphon bifidus sp. n. (24 – 27, male) and A. bidens sp. n. (28 – 30, male; 31, female). 24, T 9; 25, S 9; 26, penis; 27, tegmen and parameres. 28, S 8, T 8 and T 9 (from bottom to top); 29, S 9; 30, penis and tegmen with parameres. 31, structure recovered from inside oviduct. All to the same scale.