Dicopus noyesi Manickavasagam, 2011

Manickavasagam, S. & Rameshkumar, A., 2011, First report of three genera of fairyflies (Hymenoptera: Mymaridae) from India with description of a new species of Dicopus and some other records, Zootaxa 3094 (1), pp. 63-68 : 65-68

Dicopus noyesi Manickavasagam , sp.nov.

( Figs 1–11 )

Female. Holotype. Length, 370 micrometres. Body uniformly dark brown except vertex yellowish; eyes brownish; antenna light brown; wings subhyaline; legs yellow brown ( Fig.11 ). Head, in frontal view triangular ( Fig.1 ); head width, 51; vertex width, 31; occipital margin sharp; vertex with a single seta below each torulus; inner margin of eye more or less straight. Antennal formula 1171 ( Fig. 2 ), 1.8× body length, arising very high on face almost against transverse trabecula; scape very long, nearly 1.5× as long as head height (12:8), dilated in apical two thirds, with three indentations in dilated part and two in proximal part each bearing a long seta ( Fig. 3 ); pedicel broader than scape; F5–7 bottle-neck shaped ( Fig. 4 ); funicle segments without multiporous plate sensilla (mps); clava with two mps and beak-like in lateral view. Relative measurements of antennal segments: scape length:width, 62:7; pedicel length:width, 15:8; F1, 15; F2, 28; F3, 30; F4, 22; F5, 18; F6, 15; F7, 13; clava length:width, 48:11. Pronotum, mesoscutum and frenum (=posterior scutellum of authors) with faint, transversely striate sculpture ( Fig. 8 ). Fore wing ( Fig. 6 ) length 170, with longest marginal setae about 0.5× as long as wing length; proximal and distal macrochaeta and hypochaeta minute. Hind wing ( Fig. 7 ) disc with four small setae. Metasoma broader than mesosoma (75:52) (from slide) ( Fig. 9 ); T1 without setae; T2–6 each bearing two lateral setae, T7 with 4 setae, the setae short and spine-like; ovipositor short, arising from apex of T5; ovipositor length 0.45× of mesotibial length.

Male ( Fig. 10 ). Length 370 micrometers. Similar to female except for 10-segmented flagellum, with each flagellar segment about 4.0× as long as wide ( Fig.5 ).

Type material. Holotype female ( NPC) on slide under four coverslips, labelled “ Dicopus noyesi Manickavasagam INDIA: Tamil Nadu, Chidambaram, Annamalai University premises, 5.ix.2010, coll. Manickavasagam & Rameshkumar”.

Paratypes: 9 females (2 on slide + 7 on card), 7 males (three on slide + 4 on card), with same data as holotype ; 20 females, 10 males, INDIA: Andhra Pradesh, Rajendranagar, Hyderabad , 15.vi.2011, yellow pan trap from Psidium guajava L. orchard. Two female and two male paratypes are deposited in ZDAMU (reg. no. HYM. CH.634) and the remaining paratypes in EDAU .

Host. Unknown, but collected from both Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu in or near orchards with Psidium guajava L. and Achras zapota L.

Distribution. India: Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh.

Etymology. The species is named after the renowned chalcid specialist, Dr. John S. Noyes, of the Natural History Museum, London, UK.

Comments. Ten world species are classified in Dicopus ( Noyes 2011) . The newly described species is readily distinguished from all previously described species by features of the antennae. The shape of the scape is unique in that it is narrow medially but distinctly wider basally and, especially apically; the scape is about 9× as long as broad; F2 is 11.6× and F3 is 10.3× as long as broad, whereas females of the other 8 described species ( D. halitus Girault and D. psyche Girault both based on males) have a scape that is widest medially and tapers towards both ends, also it is less than 5× as long as wide and length of F2 and F3 do not exceed 8× their width.

Among the Oriental species, D. noyesi is closer to D. longipes (Subba Rao) which was originally described from Malaysia (Sabah) within Kubja by Subba Rao (1984) prior to synonymy of the latter by Huber (2009). It differs from D. longipes in several respects other than those listed above, including: longer F1, F2 & F3 not same length, F5–7 dilated at 2/3 from base and constriction more pronounced thereby giving a bottle-neck appearance (in D. longipes , the scape is enlarged subapically with both ends taper, F1 shorter, only F7 bottle-neck shaped though the dilation increases gradually from F5–7).

Figures

FIGURES 1–7. Dicopus noyesi, slide mounted specimens. 1, head in frontal view; 2, female antenna; 3, female scape and pedicel; 4, apical funicular segments and clava of female; 5, male antenna; 6, fore wing; 7, hind wing.

FIGURES 8–11. Dicopus noyesi, slide mounted specimens. 8, mesosoma with mesophragma; 9, female metasoma; 10 male; 11, female.