Hesperus africanus BERNHAUER 1915

Hromádka, L., 2012, Revision of the Afrotropical species of the genus Hesperus FAUVEL (Coleoptera: Staphylinidae: Philonthina), Linzer biologische Beiträge 44 (1), pp. 551-589 : 554-555

Hesperus africanus BERNHAUER 1915 (Figs 4-5)

T y p e m a t e r i a l: Holotype (damaged): Erythrea: Ghynda, Chicago NHMus M. Bernhauer collection, // africanus Bernhauer TYPUS [ochre oblong label handwritten] ( FMNH), COTYPUS:, (strongly damaged) Afr., or., Erythrea: Ghynda, Bang Haas. ( FMNH).

R e d e s c r i p t i o n: Body length 9.1 mm, length of fore body (to end of elytra) 5.1 mm.

C o l o u r a t i o n: Head, pronotum, scutellum and abdomen black, elytra red, maxillary and labial palpi, and legs yellow-red, mandibles and antennae black, base of antennomeres 2-3 red-yellow. Pronotum slightly golden iridescent.

Head transverse, distinctly wider than long (ratio 42: 32), parallel-sided, posterior angles almost rectangular vaguely rounded, bearing two long and several short bristles. Eyes flat, shorter than temples (ratio 13: 15), with wide impunctate midline, sides with many irregular coarse punctures, temporal area with punctures of variable size. Surface with fine microsculpture consisting of transverse waves.

Antennae stout and short, reaching posterior third of pronotum when reclined. Antennomere 1 twice as long as antennomere 11, antennomere 2 longer than antennomere 3, antennomeres 4-10 distinctly wider than long.

Pronotum as long as wide, sinuately narrowed posteriad. Anterior angles and lateral margins (in anterior half denser) with several variably long bristles, with wide impunctate midline. Each dorsal row with different number (12-14) of coarse punctures. Punctures much larger than eye-facets, very irregularly spaced. Surface with microsculpture similar to that on head.

Scutellum very densely and coarsely punctate, punctures mostly contigous.

Elytra longer than wide (ratio 55: 50), parallel-sided. Punctation fine and sparse, diameter of punctures approximately as large as eye-facets, separated by one and half or two puncture diameters. Surface between punctures without microsculpture; setation yellow-brown.

Legs. Metatibia longer than metatarsus (ratio 27: 25). Metatarsomere 1 longer than metatarsomere 5.

Abdomen wide, from visible tergite V slightly narrowed posteriad. First three visible tergites with two basal lines, elevated area between lines coarsely punctate. Punctation of visible tergites denser and coarser than that on elytra, gradually becoming finer and conspicuously sparser towards posterior margin of each tergite. Surface without microsculpture; setation darker than that on elytra.

Male. Unknown to the author.

Female. Protarsomeres 1-3 slightly dilated and sub-bilobed, each covered with modified pale setae ventrally, protarsomere 4 slightly narrower than preceding ones. Tergite X (Fig. 4),

C o m p a r a t i v e n o t e s Hesperus africanus is similar to H. spectabilis , but differs by the shorter eyes, darker antennomeres 1-3 and slightly golden iridescent pronotum.

D i s t r i b u t i o n: Erythrea, Sudan south ( HERMAN 2001).