Meligethes merkli Kirejtshuk, 2001 New

Lin, Xiao-Li, Chen, Ying, Huang, Min & Yang, Xing-Ke, 2015, A new species of the genus Meligethes Stephens (Coleoptera: Nitidulidae: Meligethinae) from China, Zoological Systematics 40 (3), pp. 268-289 : 273

Meligethes merkli Kirejtshuk, 2001 New record to China ( Figs 9–10 , 65–69 )

Meligethes merkli Kirejtshuk, 2001: 67 .

Description. Length 1.5–1.8 mm, breadth 1.2 mm, height 0.7 mm. Body moderately convex and oval, shiny red, pronotum light brown. Elytra and legs shiny red and rather shining; head and pronotum with dense and evident grey pubescence longer than distances among their insertions. Elytra as long as their combined width, both sides of elytra are curved, sharply narrowing distad to almost transverse at apices. Prosternal grooves obvious and wide; prosternal process obviously widened with apex broadly rounded, its broadened part distinctly broader than antennal club. Tegmen and median lobe (penis trunk) moderately sclerotised. Male genitalia with widely V-shaped apical excision on tegmen, ossiform at apex of median lobe.

Material examined. 2♂, China, Yunnan, Deqin, Adong (elev. 2 800 m), 8 April 1981, leg. Shu-Yong Wang ; 1♂, Yunnan, Zhongdian, Chongjiang River (elev. 2 800 m), 21 July 1984 , leg. Rui-Qi Wang; 1♂, China, Tibet, Jilong (elev. 2 800 m), 19 July 1975, leg. Xue-Zhong Zhang ; 1♂, China, Hebei, Xiaowutai Mountian (elev. 1 700 m), 3 July 1964, leg. Bing-Qian Li ; 1♀, China, Sanbao , 17 August 1964, leg. Su-Bai Liao.

Distribution. China (Yunnan, Tibet, Sichuan, Beijing, Hebei), Kenya.

Figures

Figs 9–16. Habitus, ♂. 9–10. Meligethes merkli Kirejtshuk. 11–12. M. matronalis Audisio & Spornkraft, 1990. 13–14. M. aeneus (Fabricius, 1775). 15–16. M. auripilis Reitter, 1889. Scale bars=0.5 mm.

Figs 65–69. Meligethes merkli Kirejtshuk, 2001, ♂. 65. Head. 66. Front tibia. 67. Prosternal process. 68. Tegmen, ventral view. 69. Medial lobe of aedeagus, ventral. Scale bar=0.5 mm.