Dohrniphora papuana (Brues)

Disney, R. Henry L., 2003, Revision of the Afrotropical species of Dohrniphora DAHL (Diptera: Phoridae), Zootaxa 196, pp. 1-24 : 16

Dohrniphora papuana (Brues)

( Fig. 22 )

Phora papuana Brues, 1905: 541 .

Dohrniphora papuana ( Brues) Brues, 1915: 96 . Dohrniphora schmitzi Kohl, 1914: 121 . (Female only). Male, Disney & Kistner, 1989: 80. Syn. nov.

This species is included in the key to Oriental species ( Disney, 1990). I have a series of males and females from the Seychelles which clearly belong to the problem species, Dohrniphora sp.?, for which Collin (1912) had only a single female. He rightly compared it with D. papuana ( Brues, 1905) , but dismissed this species from further consideration because his specimen had “a long proboscis” but the female of D. papuana had, according to Collin, a proboscis “of normal length”. In his original description of both sexes Brues makes no reference to the proboscis. However, Brues (1907) commented on the “elongated proboscis” of the female D. papuana . Furthermore, Collin (1912) refers to the “elongated proboscis” of “D. cleghorni’ (= D. cornuta ) females. In fact the females of both species covered by Collin have the lengths of the proboscis subequal. However, the males of Collin’s species has now been compared with males from the Oriental Region (referred to by Disney, 1990) and have proven to be a different species, which is described above (see D. confusa ). However, the good series of males of this complex from Yemen are indistinguishable from the Oriental specimens of D. papuana . Furthermore, a comparison of these males with those of D. schmitzi ( Kohl, 1914) , a species from mainland Africa described from females only but whose male was subsequently described by Disney & Kistner (1989), again indicates that they are indistinguishable from D. papuana apart from the fact that these D. schmitzi males have no posterodorsal hair palisade on segment 5 of the front tarsus, whereas in the available Oriental specimens of D. papuana there is typically (but not invariably) an incomplete palisade on this segment. A comparison of the females from Yemen with those from mainland Africa show that the number of anteroventral spinules above the apical spurs of the hind tibia ranges from 0­3 in the Arabian specimens but 4­7 in the West African specimens. Otherwise these females are indistinguishable. With the identical male hypopygia and spinule complexes at the base of the male hind femora I conclude that D. schmitzi is a synonym of D. papuana , but it is either a distinct subspecies (recognizable in the female sex only) or, more likely, that there is an East­West cline in the number of spinules on the female hind tibia and the likelihood of an incomplete hair palisade on the fifth segment of the front tarsus.

Figures

FIGURES 22 ­ 23. Dohrniphora males, posterior face of bases of hind femora: (22) D. papuana; (23) D. zambiae. Scale bars = 0.1 mm.