Allograpta Osten Sacken

Mengual, Ximo, Ruiz, Carlos, Rojo, Santos, Ståhls, Gunilla & Thompson, Christian, 2009, A conspectus of the flower fly genus Allograpta (Diptera: Syrphidae) with description of a new subgenus and species, Zootaxa 2214, pp. 1-28 : 7-11

Allograpta Osten Sacken

Description (adapted from Vockeroth 1969: 126). Head: Face variable in structure, yellow, with or without medial black vitta; oral opening variable; frons normal, not swollen; antenna short, less than head width; scape about as long as broad, pedicel broader than long; basoflagellomere oval to slightly elongate, not more than 1.6 times as long as broad; arista basal, bare; eye bare; male usually holoptic (only 2 New Zealand species narrowly dichoptic), ommatidia uniform.

Thorax: Postpronotum bare, yellow; scutum usually yellow laterally to transverse suture or beyond; postalar callus yellow; scutellum at least partially yellow, with distinct ventral pile fringe; anepisternum bare on anterior flattened portion; katepisternum without anterodorsal pile tuft, with dorsal and ventral pile areas separated or narrowly joined posteriorly, otherwise broadly separated anteriorly; metasternum variable; metathoracic pleuron bare; calypter bare, plumula variable. Legs: simple; metacoxa without pile tuft on posteroventral apical angle. Wing: variable; vein R4+5 straight; vein M1 (apical crossvein) processive, slightly sinuate; posterior margin without black sclerotized puncta; alula variable.

Abdomen: variable; terga without marginal sulcus. Male genitalia: typical syrphine form; cercus elongate oval; surstyle elongate oval to triangular; lingula absent; aedeagus two-segmented, with apical segment flared apically, basal segment oval to elongate, with minute dark dense appressed spicules apically (except Antillus ); superior lobe fused to hypandrium, usually triangular.

Etymology: Allograpta is derived from " allo " from the Greek meaning "another kind or strange" ( Brown 1956: 80) and " grapta " also from the Greek meaning "marked" ( Brown 1956: 379). Thus Allograpta means another kind of marking, clearly referring to the unique abdominal color pattern of the type species.

Allograpta is recognized among the syrphines (subfamily Syrphinae , tribe Syrphini ) by a combination of characters: 1) eye bare; 2) anterior anepisternum bare; 3) calypter bare; 4) abdomen without premarginal sulcus; 5) metacoxa bare posteromedially; and 6) metathoracic pleuron bare.

The specimens used to score the taxa for the attribute matrix are as follows. All specimens, unless otherwise noted, are preserved in the USNM.

Allograpta (Allograpta) alamacula Carver Australia (Holotype, ANIC)

Allograpta (Allograpta) javana (Wiedemann) India (USNM ENT 00036027)

Allograpta (Allograpta) obliqua (Say) USA: Texas (USNM ENT 00036016)

Allograpta (Allograpta) ventralis (Miller) New Zealand (USNM ENT 00035389) Allograpta (Antillus) ascita (Vockeroth) Dominican Republic (USNM ENT 00036015) Allograpta (Claraplumula) latifacies (Shannon) Peru (Holotype, USNM)

Allograpta ( Costarica) nishida Thompson Costa Rica (Holotype, INBIOCRI003724240) Allograpta ( Costarica) zumbadoi Thompson Costa Rica (Paratype, INBIOCRI002472871) Allograpta (Fazia) centropogonis Nishida Costa Rica (Paratype, INBIOCRI002538891) Allograpta (Fazia) decemmaculata (Rondani) Chile (Holotype of bullaephora Shannon , USNM) Allograpta (Rhinoprosopa) aenea (Hull) Dominican Republic (USNM ENT 00036014) Allograpta (Rhinoprosopa) flavophylla (Hull) Costa Rica (INBIOCRI003788089) Anu una Thompson New Zealand (Holotype, NZAC)

Citrogramma henryi Ghorphade Sri Lanka (Holotype, USNM)

Eosphaerophoria n. sp. Vietnam (USNM ENT 00036031)

Episyrphus balteatus (De Geer) Ireland (USNM ENT 00036026)

Exallandra cinctifacies (Speiser) Kenya (USNM ENT 00035918)

Giluwea flavomacula Vockeroth New Guinea (Paratype, USNM ENT 00035915) Meliscaeva cinctella (Zetterstedt) Denmark (USNM ENT 00029694)

Sphaerophoria (Loveridgeana) beattiei (van Doesburg & van Doesburg) Saint Helena (Paratype, USNM ENT 00114661) Sphaerophoria (Sphaerophoria) novaeangliae Johnson USA: New Hampshire (USNM ENT 00036030) Sphaerophoria (Sphaerophoria) scripta (Linnaeus) Germany (USNM ENT 00036029) Syrphus ribesii (Linnaeus) Norway (USNM ENT 00036028)

The only genera likely to be confused with Allograpta are Sphaerophoria and Exallandra and the confusion is only with the typic subgenus. The other subgenera are readily distinguished from these genera by their facial shape (anteriorly extended) and automorphic characters (apical wing maculae, petiolate abdomen). Vockeroth (1969: 133) pointed out the difficulty of distinguishing Sphaerophoria [and Exallandra ] females from those of Allograpta , "specifically if the latter lack the oblique tergite markings commonly found in that genus." Allograpta ( sensu stricto) has a complete subscutellar fringe, which is well developed and at least moderately dense, whereas Sphaerophoria and Exallandra have a reduced or no subscutellar fringe.

Distribution. Allograpta is found in all Biotic Regions, but is absent from most of the Palaearctic Region and northern areas of the Nearctic (see fig. 22). The genus is absent from the western Palaearctic and occurs only along the southeastern edge of the region (from southern Far Eastern Russia, south to China). Only the typic subgenus is known from outside the Neotropical Region. The greatest diversity is found in the Neotropics, but there is a small radiation also in New Zealand. The species counts for the various regions are Palaearctic (2), Nearctic (4), Neotropical (52), Afrotropical (12), Oriental (10), Australian (33) and Oceania (10).

Allograpta species are structurally rather uniform throughout the World except in the Neotropics and New Zealand. The structural diversity is documented in the Neotropics by a number of subgeneric groups, but the diversity in New Zealand is not.

Characters