Lytopylus Förster 1862

Sharkey, Michael, Yu, Dicky, van Noort, Simon, Seltmann, Katja & Penev, Lyubomir, 2009, Revision of the Oriental genera of Agathidinae (Hymenoptera, Braconidae) with an emphasis on Thailand and interactive keys to genera published in three different formats, ZooKeys 21 (2), pp. 19-54 : 45-46

Lytopylus Förster 1862 , stat. n.

Type species: Lytopylus azygos Viereck, 1905 .

Aerophilina Enderlein, 1920 , syn. n. Type species: Aerophilina bicristata Enderlein, 1920 .

Aerophilopsis Viereck, 1913 , syn. n. Type species: Bassus erythrogaster Viereck, 1913 .

Facilagathis van Achterberg & Chen, 2004 , syn. n. Type species: Facilagathis spinulata van Achterberg & Chen, 2004 .

Hormagathis Brues, 1926 , syn. n. Type species: Hormagathis mellea Brues, 1926 .

Ioxia Enderlein, 1920 , syn. n. Type species: Ioxia faceta Enderlein, 1920 .

Neomicrodus Szépligeti, 1908 , syn. n. Type species: Neomicrodus boliviensis Szépligeti, 1908 .

Obesomicrodus Papp, 1971 , syn. n. Type species: Obesomicrodus niger Papp, 1971 .

Taxonomy. Sharkey et al. (2006) demonstrated the polyphyly of the generic concept Bassus as it has been used over the past few decades ( Nixon 1986, Simbolotti and van Achter- berg 1992, Sharkey 1997), and further showed that a stricter sense of Bassus was a monophyletic group and sister to Braunsia . However they did not examine the type specimen of Bassus which does not happen to belong to the same clade as the specimens included in their analyses. Here we have selected the oldest available name for what was referred to as Bassus s.s. in Sharkey et al. (2006). Lytopylus was first proposed by Förster 1862 but no species were assigned to the genus until Viereck (1914) included L. azygos as the type.

Distribution: Cosmopolitan, with more diversity in temperate regions. Only one species of Lytopylus has been collected in Th ailand but the occurrence of more members of the genus is likely. Bhat and Gupta (1977) included members of Lytopylus under Agathis . These include L. aequoreticulatus ( Bhat & Gupta, 1977) , L. astioles (Nixon, 1950) , L. burmensis ( Bhat & Gupta, 1977) , L. phillipinensis ( Bhat & Gupta, 1977) and L. romani (Shestakov, 1940) all new combinations.

Diversity: Highly speciose.

Biology: Most commonly attacking species of Tortricidae and Pyralidae , other reliable records include: Elachistidae , Gelechiidae , and Th yrididae. Undoubtedly many other host families will be confirmed or discovered.

Phylogenetic Information. Sister to Braunsia (as Bassus s.s. in Sharkey et al. 2006).

Diagnosis: Metasomal median tergites 1–3 sculptured (Fig.14a), first median tergite with prominent lateral longitudinal carinae defining a median elevated area; second submarginal cell lacking adventitious 2 RS vein ( Fig. 30b). Th is diagnosis does not work well for other regions.