Laparocerus tenellus Wollaston, 1864

Machado, Antonio, 2006, The type material of the species of Laparocerus Schönherr, 1834 (Coleoptera, Curculionidae, Entiminae), Journal of Natural History 40 (35 - 37), pp. 2001-2055 : 2039-2040

Laparocerus tenellus Wollaston, 1864

Laparocerus tenellus Wollaston 1864, p 362 .

Type locality. Los Organos (Agua Mansa), Tenerife, Canary Islands.

Lectotype: 1„, without right antennal flagellum and right hind leg. Spring 1858, Organo Rocks, Agua Mansa, leg. Wollaston (ex litt.) [Type] [ Laparocerus / tenellus /Woll. type].

NHM, London. Paralectotype: 1♀, without left posterior tibia; same data [Hope Entomological/Collections/Wollaston Coll.] [ Laparocerus / tenellus Woll. ]. UMO, Oxford.

Laparocerus tessellatus (Brulle´, 1839)

Omias tessellatus Brullé 1839, p 72 , Plate I Figure 15 (published 1840).

Type locality. Chinobre (Anaga), Tenerife, Canary Islands ( UTM 28 R 038495 315950).

Neotype: 1„ [Tenerife, Islas Canarias /Anaga: Pista a Chinobre, 700 m. / 19-2-2000 partôut/ # 179, leg. A. Machado] [NEOTYPUS / Omias tessellatus / Brullé 1839 /des. A. Machado, 2005]. TFMC (reg. CO-15503), Santa Cruz de Tenerife ( Figure 9A ).

Remarks. Only the identification label of Omias tessellatus and the hole of a pin are in the box containing the material of Webb and Berthelot from the Canaries, deposited in the Coll. Générale at the Museum National d’Histoire Naturelle, at Paris. The curator Mlle Hélène Perrin and I were not able to find it in other collections. The type is apparently lost. Brullé (1839) did not mention an island of origin, but Wollaston (1864, p 360) associated Brullé’s brief description to populations from Tenerife, El Hierro, and La Palma (Wollaston does not mention the type of Brulle´, and he studied the coleoptera of Webb and Berthelot at Paris (perhaps already lost?). This interpretation of L. tessellatus has been accepted up to the present date. However, unpublished molecular data reveal that each island has a differentiated population, and, to a lesser extent, the same happens within Tenerife. Therefore it is highly necessary to fix the concept of this taxon by establishing a neotype. From the set of Teneriffan carabid species provided by Webb and Berthelot, it can be deduced that they all were collected in the mountains of Anaga, probably Monte Aguirre, just above the capital Santa Cruz de Tenerife ( Machado 1992, p 266). I have selected a specimen from the interior of Anaga (Chinobre) as the neotype. The punctuation of the pronotum is much weaker and superficial, and the elytra more globose (particularly in the females).

Figures

Figure 9. (A) Neotype of Omias tessellatus Brulle´, 1839; (B) neotype of Lichenophagus incomptus Wollaston, 1865.