Onthophagus bicolor, Raffray, 1877

Ziani, Stefano, Abdel-Dayem, Mahmoud Saleh, Aldhafer, Hathal Mohammed & Barbero, Enrico, 2019, An overview of the Onthophagini from the Arabian Peninsula (Coleoptera: Scarabaeoidea: Scarabaeidae), Zootaxa 4658 (1), pp. 1-36 : 23

Onthophagus bicolor species group

Remarks. Zunino (1975) noticed that the internal sac of the aedeagus of Onthophagus bicolor Raffray, 1877 and O. latipennis d’Orbigny, 1898 lacks the lamella copulatrix as well as spicules and raspulae. Only some accessory lamellae are present, as happens in males of the genus Phalops Erichson, 1848 . Females of O. bicolor and O. latipennis show a vagina with no defined sclerotizations and infundibulum. Furthermore, males of both species have a strong pygidial sexual dimorphism, with a significant decrease of the size of the abdominal sternites, medially. For all these reasons a few years later Zunino (1981) supposed that it could be reasonable to institute a distinct genus for O. bicolor and O. latipennis and some other species from east Africa, but without establishing a new taxon. Waiting for a deeper study of the Afrotropical species with the same genital characteristics, we herein choose to follow Zunino (1981) and to insert the two quoted species in a species-group, with no nomenclatorial value, always within the genus Onthophagus .