Dociostaurus biskrensis Moussi and Petit

Moussi, Abdelhamid, Abba, Abderrahmane, Harrat, Abboud & Petit, Daniel, 2014, Description of Dociostaurus biskrensis sp. nov. and male allotypes of four species: Pamphagulus bodenheimeri dumonti, P. uvarovi, Sphingonotus ebneri and Notopleura pygmaea (Orthoptera: Acridoidea) in the region of Biskra, Algeria, Zootaxa 3755 (4), pp. 379-390 : 381-383

Dociostaurus biskrensis Moussi and Petit sp. nov.

( Fig. 1 )

Type material. Holotype male: found at Bir Naam, Biskra Wilaya, 222 m, 34°45’N, 5°8’ E, 02/07/2011, MNHN Paris. MNHN-EO-CAELIF995

Allotype female: Bir Naam, 23/07/2008, MNHN Paris.

Paratype female: University of Limoges, found at Kantara, 11/05/2013

Paratype male: University of Biskra, found at Bir Naam, 23/07/2008

Description. Smaller than D. jagoi ; brownish with sharp brown spots. The vertex is short, bordered by prominent carinae, with subacute apex; temporal foveolae longer than wide, adjacent to apex, with very sharp edges; frontal costa is slightly furrowed and pitted, and antennae are filiform. The pronotum has a well distinct white cross, especially in the metazone, edged with blackish-brown below. Hind femurs have very marked brown spots. Hind femur with the genicular lobe pale below in its inner and outer sides, as opposed to D. jagoi where they are much dimmed, at least on their inner sides. Hind tibiae slightly bluish with ten spines on each side. There are 67 to 93 stridulatory pegs on hind femora in the males, unlike D. jagoi jagoi in which their number ranges between 33 and 52. Tegmina exceed abdomen in both sexes, transparent with traces of brown spots. The wings are hyaline. Male subgenital plate short, conical and hairy.

The male genitalia: The epiphallus formed by a bridge with well-developed horny ancorae and lophi bent twice. The penis is short and curved. The upper lobes of lophi in D. biskrensis are larger than in D. jagoi jagoi .

Female: Slightly larger and more robust than males. The ovipositor valves are short, the lower valves with a few large pits below.

Etymology. The " biskrensis " species epithet is derived from the name of locality of sampling (Biskra).

Bio-ecology. Diet: The examination of 8 faeces of D. biskrensis collected in July for analyses showed that the species consumes a mixture of two types of grasses in the family Poaceae and four types of dicots. This species would be an ambivore. However, from 8 faeces of D. jagoi collected in August, we found 3 types of dicots with a very low percentage of grass. The diet is thus forbivorous to ambivorous.

Phenology: As we identified two periods of appearance for adults and larvae during spring and autumn ( Moussi et al., 2011), the cycle is probably bivoltine. There are two generations per year with embryonic overwintering, the mid-year period seeing the end of the first generation and the beginning of the second. On the other hand, according to Bounechada et al. (2006) and Guendouz-Benrima et al. (2011) D. jagoi jagoi is a univoltine species with a single generation throughout the year with an embryonic diapause.

To discriminate the new species in the genus Dociostaurus , the morphometric measurements concerned the most relevant criteria defined by the following authors: Chopard (1943), Defaut (2004), and Garcia et al. (2005) (table 1). The characters are the number of pegs (Pegs) on the internal face of hind femurs, the length of the file or comb (File length), i.e. of the ridge bearing the pegs, the tegmina length (Tegmina), the head length, the total body length (total length), the femur width and length, and the pronotum length.

If we compare the new species to the other Dociostaurus in North Africa, it shares with D. jagoi a smaller size (17–30 mm for males, 20–33 mm for females) than in the 3 other species of North Africa ( D. dantini , D. hammadae and D. maroccanus ). The Figure 2 displays the envelopes of six groups corresponding to the males and females of D. genei , D. jagoi jagoi and D. biskrensis . As the envelopes are quite distinct for females, it is easy to distinguish the three species between both species. However, the envelope of male D. biskrensis is separated from those of D. genei and D. jagoi jagoi . This is not really a problem as D. genei does not exist in North Africa ( Eades et al. 2012). According to the Discriminant analysis (A.D., data not shown), the number of stridulatory pegs and the length of tegmina are the characters that contribute the most in the distinction between the D. biskrensis form the two other species either for males or females.

This new species has more pegs on the internal ridge of its hind tibia (67 to 93 in males, 55 to 74 in females) than D. jagoi jagoi (33 to 52 in males, 26 to 48 in females). The internal ridge is also longer in D. biskrensis (Mean = 2.84 mm in males, 3.70 in females) than in D. jagoi jagoi (Mean = 2.28 in males, 2.61 in females) although there is an overlap between species. There is also an overlap for tegmina lengths between both species, but the easiest character to consider is the difference between hind knees and tegmina tips: 2.9 to 4.3 mm in D. biskrensis , and 2.2 to 3.8 in D. jagoi jagoi . As for Dociostaurus genei , we found 42 to 59 pegs in males, 48 to 64 in females, giving values close to D. jagoi jagoi .

Character P. uvarovi uvarovi ♂ P. b. dumonti ♂ P. uvarovi uvarovi ♀ P. b. dumonti ♀

(mm) (19 individuals) (18 individuals) (22 individuals) (25 individuals) Character (mm) Sphingonotus ebneri Males (n=4) Notopleura pygmaea Males (n=5)

min moy ± sd max min moy ± sd max Total length of body 14.5 14.8± 0.20 15 11.4 11.9± 0.30 12.1 Tegmina length 14.4 15.3± 0.90 16.2 10.8 11.2± 0.30 11.5 Hind femur length 7.2 7.9± 0.80 9.1 7.1 7.7± 0.40 8.2 Hind femur width 2.1 2.2± 0.10 2.4 1.7 1.8± 0.01 1.8 Pronotum length 2.7 3.1± 0.30 3.3 2.1 2.2± 0.10 2.3 Head length 2.2 2.3± 0.10 2.4 1.8 1.9± 0.12 2 Species Forbivore Ambivore Monophagous D. biskrensis +

D. jagoi jagoi +

N. pygmaea +

S. ebneri +

P. bodenheimeri dumonti + P. uvarovi uvarovi +

Figures

FIGURE 1. Dociostaurus biskrensis: A: lateral view of the female; B: lateral view of penis valves; C: dorsal view of the female; D: lateral view of the male; E: front head of the female; F: right tegmen of the male; G: dorsal view of epiphallus; H: dorsal view of epiphallus of D. jagoi jagoi; I: epiphallus of D. genei. Scale bar = 1 mm.

FIGURE 2. Projection on the two first axes of ACP for morphometric characters of D. biskrensis D. jagoi jagoi and D. genei.