Telegeusidae

Zaragoza-Caballero, Santiago & Zurita-García, Martín Leonel, 2015, A preliminary study on the phylogeny of the family Phengodidae (Insecta: Coleoptera), Zootaxa 3947 (4), pp. 527-542 : 538-539

Taxonomy of Telegeusidae

Our study corroborates a close relationship between the Telegeusidae and Penicillophorinae. Ivie (2002) transferred Pseudokarumia Pic from Dascillidae to Telegeusidae , and provided a key to separate Telegeusis , Pseudotelegeusis and Pseudokarumia. Pseudokarumia species share the following characters diagnostic of the family ( Lawrence et al. 1999; Miller 2002): body narrow and large; labrum tri-lobed; last maxillary palpomere as long as antennae; pronotal disk with lateral impressions; elytra short; mesotibial spur serrate; abdomen with 8 ventrites. Ivie (2002) described Pseudokarumia having eyes small; antennal insertions separated, mesotibial spur serrated; postocular space (1.5 to 3 times the length of eye), maxillary palps long; pronotal disk with lateral impressions; elytra short: abdomen with eight ventrites. He also segregated Pseudotelegeusis Wittmer of Pseudokarumia Pic by the shape of antennae (serrate or filiform), distance between eyes and posterior margin of the head (reduced or wide), number of labial palpomeres (1 or 1–2). Our results support the transfer of Pseudokarumia to Telegeusidae and so corroborate the Ivie proposal.

The Telegeusidae as designated by Leng (1920) is comprised of Telegeusis Horn and Pseudotelegeusis Wittmer. Horn (1895) originally described and included Telegeusis in the Lampyridae , and in the same publication this genus was associated with Drilini . Barber (1913) related Telegeusis with Lymexyloidea and as a monobasic genus. This proposal was rejected by Martin (1931) who transferred it to Cantharidae . King (1955) placed Atractocerus Palisot in Lymexylidae and suggested an association with Telegeusis . Crowson (1955) related it to Phengodes , based on the shared same configuration of male genitalia. Crowson (1972) defined the family Telegeusidae based on the structure of the aedeagus and tentorium. Zaragoza (1990) noted that the reduced venation of the hind wing in the genera Telegeusis , Pseudotelegeusis (Telegeusidae) and Titthonyx LeConte ( Cantharidae ) is a pattern shared with Walterius Zaragoza and Tarsakanthus Zaragoza (Phengodidae) . The same author noted that Telegeusis , Cenophengus LeConte , Distremocephalus Wittmer and Walterius have two tentorial pits whereas the genera Phengodes , Zarhipis LeConte, Tarsakanthus , Pseudotelegeusis and other taxa have one pit only. Lawrence & Newton (1995) defined the superfamily Elateroidea (incl. Phengodidae and Telegeusidae ) on wing configuration and they recognized two patterns, an elateroid type and another with reduced venation. This last pattern, presence of tentorial pits and antennal configuration are characters that suggest a close relationship between Telegeusis and the subfamily Penicillophorinae. Recent work based on molecular evidence suggests different hypotheses about the relationships of Telegeusidae , with Bocakova et al. (2007), Kundrata & Bocak (2011) and Kundrata et al. (2013) relating Telegeusis with Omethidae . In the study of Hunt et al. (2007), we found different hypotheses, with either under the parsimony criterion Telegeusis is related with Phengodidae , or under the Bayesian approach it is associated with Omethidae . Kundrata et al. (2014) also associated Telegeusis with Omethidae and mentioned that the similar shape of labrum is a character that supports this relationship. The present study based on morphological evidence does not corroborate the conclusions of these molecular studies.

Jeng (2008) studied the evolution of neoteny in cantharoid-elateroid lineage with a full data set of 220 species and 410 characters ((incl. Omethidae : Drilonius striatulus Kiensewetter , Omethes marginatus LeConte , O. rugiceps (Lewis) , Troglomethes leechi Fender , Malthomethes oregonus , Matheteus theveneti LeConte and Ginglymocladus luteicollis Van Dyke )), and Lawrence et al. (2011) focused in the phylogeny of the Coleoptera based on morphological characters of adults and larvae (incl. Omethidae : Matheteus theveneti LeConte ), both concluded that Telegeusis is nested into Phengodidae (and Omethidae with Lycidae and Cantharidae respectively). All these works (molecular and morphological) lacked representatives of the Penicillophorinae.

Here, we suggest a close relationship between Phengodidae and Telegeusidae (both strictly from New World), specifically with the genera of the subfamily Penicillophorinae, demonstrated as monophyletic. The fact that Telegeusidae +Penicillophorinae are nested into the clade that contains the terminals of external group could be an artifact of our sampling of outgroups. Telegeusidae was recovered as non-monophyletic due to that Pseudotelegeusis is sister to Penicillophorinae. Pseudotelegeusis is characterized as having the maxillary palps 4- segmented, the last palpomere as long as the three previous, labial palps 1-segmented and one tentorial pit. The main difference between Pseudotelegeusis and the penicillophorines is the length of the last maxillary palpomere relative to the basal ones.