Oedichirus nitidiventris, Rougemont, 2018

Rougemont, Guillaume de, 2018, The genus Oedichirus in New Caledonia (Staphylinidae: Paederinae: Pinophilini), Linzer biologische Beiträge 50 (1), pp. 537-586 : 558

Oedichirus nitidiventris nov.sp. (Figs 35)

Material studied: ♀ Holotype: NEW CALEDONIA, Prov. Sud, Mt. Koghis 518 m, 22º10’44"S 166º30’32"E, VII ♀ 21-24.2008, L. Herman, leaf litter nr. stream & slope to stream ♀ HOLOTYPE Oedichirus nitidiventris Des. 2017 G. de Rougemont [ AMNH] ; 1 paratype: [Ibid.] ♀ PARATYPE Oedichirus nitidiventris des. 2017 G. de Rougemmont [ CRO] .

Description: length: ca. 7.8; length of fore-body: 3.5; length of head: 0.95; breadth of head: 1.75; length of pronotum: 1.32; breadth of pronotum: 1.22; length of elytron: 1.17; breadth of elytra: 1.35. Vertex of head piceous, surrounding surface rufescent, pronotum piceous. The anterior angles and posterior angles rufescent, elytra reddish-brown, the scutellary area slightly infuscate; abdomen bicolorous, the sides brown, the centres of tergites with an increasingly broad black band occupying nearly the entire dorsal surface on tergites VI and VII; palpi, antennae and legs entirely testaceous. Dorsal surfaces devoid of microsculpture except for indistinct micro-striation on abdominal tergites VI-VIII. Dorsal surface devoid of visible pubescence.

Head strongly transverse; eyes large and salient, about as long as temples; groove of post-ocular border a little removed from lateral margin, not very evident; vertex with a dense cluster of ca 20 round umbilicate punctures, with scattered smaller punctures before it. Pronotum short, the sides convergent in almost straight lines from broad anterior angles to base; lateral margins entirely but bluntly and inconspicuously bordered; puncturation not forming series, fairly coarse and dense but irregular, the interstices in most parts greater than diameter of punctures. Elytra broad and short; puncturation about as coarse as but a little sparser than that of pronotum. Keels and grooves of bases of abdominal tergites short and shallow, becoming obsolete after tergite V; puncturation consisting only of an anterior row of punctures and a row of less numerous punctures on posterior margin, with a few scattered punctures on sides, leaving the central part of each tergite impunctate.

Female: abdominal sternite IX: Fig. 35vp.

The abdominal puncturation of this species is similar to but even sparser than those of O. ianitrix nov.sp., O. loebli nov.sp. and O. giachinoi nov.sp. ( O. ianitrix has a few small scattered punctures between the rows on anterior and posterior margins of tergites, whereas the middle of tergites is completely impunctate in O. nitidiventris ). It differs from the other two species by its broader build and the dense puncturation of the vertex of head, and from all three by the conformation of the female ninth sternite.