Oxypoda determinata SCRIBA 1870

Assing, V., 2012, On the taxonomy and zoogeography of some Oxypoda species of the West Palaearctic region (Coleoptera: Staphylinidae: Aleocharinae), Linzer biologische Beiträge 44 (1), pp. 365-399 : 390-392

Oxypoda determinata SCRIBA 1870 ( Figs 42-43 )

Oxypoda determinata SCRIBA 1870: 78 f.

Oxypoda incerta EPPELSHEIM 1884: 370 .

Oxypoda telifera ASSING 2008: 1318 ff; nov.syn.

Type material examined O. determinata and O. incerta : Lectotype [ O. incerta ], present designation, and neotype [ O. determinata ], present designation: "incerta mihi. Andalusia. ded. Simon. / incerta Epp. Berl. ent. Zeit. 1884. p. 370. / c. Eppelsh. Steind. d. / Typus / Lectotypus Oxypoda incerta Eppelsheim , desig. V. Assing 2012 / Neotypus Oxypoda determinata Scriba , desig. V. Assing 2012" (NHMW) . Paralectotypes: 1: on same pin as lectotype ( NHMW) ; 1: "Algeciras / incerta mihi. Algeciras. Quedenfeldt. / = haemorrhoa Sahlb. Certi / c. Eppelsh. Steind. d. / Typus" (NHMW) .

Additional material examined: Spain:1, Cortez de la Frontera (CA), Sierra Cortez de la Frontera, 1200 m, 2.X.1993, leg. Wunderle (cWun).

Comment: The original description of O. determinata is based on an unspecified number of syntypes from " Guarda, Serrae Estrellae Lusitaniae" collected by "Dom. de Heyden" ( SCRIBA 1870). The type material is evidently lost. It was looked for, but found neither in the Senckenberg Museum in Frankfurt (HASTENPFLUG- VESMANIS, e-mail 10 Feb., 2012), where the Scriba collection is deposited, nor in the SDEI (BEHNE, e-mail 24 Oct., 2011), where the Heyden collection is housed.

EPPELSHEIM (1884) described O. incerta based on several syntypes ("in einigen Stücken") from Algeciras. The name was synonymised with O. determinata a decade later ( EPPELSHEIM 1894) and has been treated as a synonym ever since. Three syntypes, a male and two females, were located in the collections at the NHMW. The male is designated as the lectotype.

Oxypoda telifera was described from a holotype and a paratype, both males, from the environs of Cortez de la Frontera in Andalucía ( ASSING 2008). An examination of the type material of O. incerta revealed that it is undoubtedly conspecific with O. telifera .

In view of the fact that the Iberian peninsula hosts a number of species that are externally similar to the type material of O. incerta , that are reliably distinguished only based on their genitalia, and that the original description of O. determinata may refer to several of them, the designation of a neotype for O. determinata seems indispensible to unambiguously define the identity of that name. In order to cause the least possible nomenclatural disturbance it appears advisable to stabilise the long-standing synonymy with O. incerta rather than to propose new synonymies. Therefore, the lectotype of O. incerta is here designated as the neotype of O. determinata , thus rendering O. incerta EPPELSHEIM an objective junior synonym of O. determinata SCRIBA.

The distribution of O. determinata requires clarification. According to SMETANA (2004), the species has been reported from the Iberian peninsula ( Spain, Portugal) and North Africa ( Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco), but all previous records must be considered doubtful; they may well refer to other, externally similar species such as O. imminuta . The aedeagus of the neotype is illustrated in Fig. 42 , that of the type material of O. telifera in ASSING (2008), and the spermatheca of a paralectotype of O. incerta in Fig. 43 .

Figures

Figs 42-50: Oxypoda determinata SCRIBA (42-43; 42: neotype of O. determinata and lectotype of O. incerta EPPELSHEIM; 43: paralectotype of O. incerta), O. hispanica BERNHAUER (44-45; 44: lectotype; 45: paralectotype), and O. flavicornis KRAATZ (46-50) from Sicily (46-47), northern Anatolia (48), and Albania (49-50): (42, 44, 46-49) median lobe of aedeagus in lateral view; (43, 45, 50) spermatheca. Scale bars: 0.1 mm.