Culicoides (Drymodesmyia) byersi Atchley

Phillips, Robert A., 2022, Culicoides Latreille and Leptoconops Skuse biting midges of the southwestern United States with emphasis on the Canyonlands of southeastern Utah (Diptera: Ceratopogonidae), Insecta Mundi 2022 (907), pp. 1-214 : 61

Culicoides (Drymodesmyia) byersi Atchley

(Fig. 114, 168, 214, 250)

Culicoides (Drymodesmyia) byersi Atchley, 1967: 983 (key; numerical characters; female; male genitalia; fig. female wing, palpus, spermathecae, male genitalia, parameres; New Mexico). Wirth et al. 1985: 14 (numerical characters; fig. female wing).

Diagnosis. ( Tables 14, 15) Brown; wing pattern moderately faint; r 2 dark; pale spot at end of costa oval and not extending back beneath r 2; distal pale spots present in r 3, m 1, m 2, cua 1 and anal cell; in r 3 and m 1, not close to wing margin; in r 3, elongate and aimed diagonally toward costa, but often faint; mandible with 9–11 minute teeth; pore of sensory pit on palpal segment 3 <0.3 the diameter of segment, widening internally (as in Fig. 249 C. hinmani ); pale banding absent subapically from mid femora, basally and subapically from hind femora, subapically from hind tibiae; ventro-posterior membrane of male sternite 9 not spiculate; ventral apodeme of gonocoxite simple, up to 2× longer and only a little more slender than dorsal apodeme; aedeagus simple, nearly V-shaped, median process evenly tapering to broad truncate tip, aedeagal ratio ~0.3; parameres separate, apices simple contorted pointed.

Distribution. California, Utah (Grand County), Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico. Culicoides byersi is the southwestern treehole-inhabiting counterpart to the morphologically similar and more northern and eastern C. (Drymodesmyia) hinmani , which known ranges overlap in only Utah and Colorado.

Larval ecology and adult behavior. Culicoides byersi has been reared from a cottonwood treehole in Colorado ( Pappas et al. 1991), and the mandibular and lacinial teeth on the female indicate it feeds on vertebrate blood. Furthermore, the combination of its unusually minute teeth and treehole larval habitat with its frequent collection in low-level CO 2 -baited traps ( Table 4) suggests a small mammal, ground-dwelling bird, or generalist small-animal feeding preference.