Tuponia (Chlorotuponia) chinensis Zheng & Li, 1992

Min Suk, Oh, Kim, WonGun, Park, Jihwan & Lee, Seunghwan, 2023, Additional record of Tuponia Reuter (Heteroptera, Miridae, Phylinae) from Korea, with a new synonym and discussion on distribution, Biodiversity Data Journal 11, pp. 104644-104644 : 104644

Tuponia (Chlorotuponia) chinensis Zheng & Li, 1992

Tuponia Tuponia Chlorotuponia chinensis Tuponia chinensis Zheng & Li, 1992 - Zheng and Li 1992: 12.

Tuponia Tuponia Chlorotuponia chinensis Tuponia koreana Kim & Jung, 2021 - Kim et al. 2021: 1268. New synonymy.

Materials

Type status: Other material. Occurrence: recordedBy: Jihwan Park; individualCount: 10; sex: 5♂, 5♀; lifeStage: adult; Taxon: scientificName: Tuponia (Chlorotuponia) chinensis Zheng & Li, 1992; Location: country: Republic of Korea; stateProvince: Incheon-si; locality: Sorae Wetlands Ecology Park, Nonhyeon-dong, Namdong-gu ; Identification: identifiedBy: MinSuk Oh; Event: eventDate: 31.vii.2021; habitat: on Tamarix chinensis; Record Level: institutionCode: SNU Type status: Other material. Occurrence: recordedBy: Jihwan Park; individualCount: 1; sex: 1♀; lifeStage: adult; Taxon: scientificName: Tuponia (Chlorotuponia) chinensis Zheng & Li, 1992; Location: country: Republic of Korea; stateProvince: Incheon-si; locality: Sorae Wetlands Ecology Park, Nonhyeon-dong, Namdong-gu ; Identification: identifiedBy: MinSuk Oh; Event: eventDate: 31.vii.2021; habitat: on Tamarix chinensis; Record Level: institutionCode: NIBR

Diagnosis

Recognised by elongate oval body, 1.8-2.3 mm; basic colouration pale green to yellowish-green, weakly shining (Fig. 1 A-C, Fig. 2 A-D); dorsum covered with pale sericeous setae and dark brown setae; labium reaches metacoxa; hemelytra pale green, covered with long, sericeous setae and dark brown, simple setae; tibial spine blackish-brown, base without dark spot. Male genitalia (Fig. 4 A-I): Endosoma S-shaped, with two elongated, twisted sclerites; secondary gonopore situated subapically between the two sclerites; left paramere with thick and round sensory lobe; sub-basal part of sensory lobe with elongated, pointed-end process; hypophysis sub-triangular, pointed-end; right paramere rather elongated and flat, slightly curved; hypophysis short. Female genitalia (Fig. 6 A-C): Sclerotised ring ovoid, thin-rimmed; interramal sclerites slender and elongated. For detailed diagnostic characters and figures, see Zheng and Li (1992), Li and Liu (2016) and Kim et al. (2021).

Measurements

Male (n = 5). Total body length 1.86-2.07; head width across eyes 0.53-0.57; vertex width 0.29-0.32; lengths of antennal segment I-IV 0.14-0.18, 0.54-0.62, 0.38-0.39, 0.20-0.21; labial length 0.68-0.74; mesal pronotal length including collar 0.33-0.38; basal pronotal width 0.68-0.82; width across hemelytron 0.76-0.93; cuneal length 0.32-0.36; cuneal width 0.19-0.23; lengths of metafemur, tibia and tarsus 0.74-0.76, 1.07-1.14, 0.35-0.39. Female (n = 5). Total body length 1.85-2.06; head width across eyes 0.55-0.60; vertex width 0.32-0.35; lengths of antennal segment I-IV 0.15-0.19, 0.55-0.63, 0.34-0.41, 0.22-0.25; labial length 0.71-0.74; mesal pronotal length including collar 0.36-0.39; basal pronotal width 0.71-0.81; width across hemelytron 0.83-1.01; cuneal length 0.33-0.37; cuneal width 0.20-0.26; lengths of metafemur, tibia and tarsus 0.79-0.82, 1.08-1.18, 0.32-0.37.

Distribution

Korea (Incheon), China (Tianjin, Hebei, Shandong, Ningxia, Shaanxi) ( Zheng and Li 1992, Li and Liu 2016, Kim et al. 2021).

Biology

Known host plant is Tamarix chinensis ( Tamaricaceae ) ( Zheng and Li 1992, Li and Liu 2016, Kim et al. 2021).

Notes

We examined specimens of Tuponia chinensis in SNU and propose T. koreana Kim & Jung as a junior synonym of T. chinensis Zheng & Li. The diagnostic characteristics of T. koreana nearly match those of T. chinensis and the genitalia of the two nominal species are identical. Kim et al. (2021) separated T. koreana from T. chinensis by the following characters: i) metatarsal segment II distinctly shorter than segment III, ii) left paramere with one long process pointing down and iii) endosoma without visible secondary gonopore. However, as in Fig. 7 , they only measured the length of each segment at the ventral side of the metatarsus and the actual length of segment II is not distinctly shorter than that of segment III. Additionally, in the structure of the left paramere, our specimen shows a straight lateral process (Fig. 4 C). However, we could not find other structural differences and concluded that these were minor intraspecific variations. In addition, Kim et al. (2021) stated that a secondary gonopore of T. koreana is 'clearly invisible,' but it can be seen upon displacement of the two apical sclerites of the endosoma, as shown in Fig. 4 E-H. When compared with the description of Zheng and Li (1992), the secondary gonopore of the Korean specimen looks conspecific in its subapical location and rugged margin.

Figures

Figure 2. Dorsal habitus of Korean Tuponia chinensis. A, B Male; C, D Female. Scale bar: 1.0 mm.

Figure 4. Male genital structure of Korean Tuponia chinensis. A, E-H, endosoma; B, I phallotheca; C left paramere; D right paramere. Scale bar: 0.1 mm.

Figure 6. Female genital structure of Korean Tuponia species. A-C, T. chinensis; D-G T. mongolica (A, D: bursa copulatrix (before dissected posterior wall); B, E bursa copulatrix (dorsal view); F bursa copulatrix (ventral view); C, G: posterior wall). Scale bar: 0.2 mm.

Figure 7. Metatarsus of Tuponia chinensis. Red arrow indicates segment borders in the dorsal side of tarsus and blue arrow indicates segment borders in the ventral side. Ratio of tarsal segments visualised with red bar (dorsal view: a), blue bar (ventral view: b) and black bar (actual length: c). A male; B female; C holotype male, a traced picture of Kim et al. (2021): fig. 1 C; D a traced picture of Kim et al. (2021): fig. 1 D.