Aedes (Rampamyia) notoscriptus (Skuse)

Harbach, Ralph E. & Wilkerson, Richard C., 2023, The insupportable validity of mosquito subspecies (Diptera: Culicidae) and their exclusion from culicid classification, Zootaxa 5303 (1), pp. 1-184 : 47

Aedes (Rampamyia) notoscriptus (Skuse)

subspecies montanus Brug, 1939 —original combination: Aedes (Finlaya) notoscriptus var. montana [sic] (subgeneric status by Stone et al. 1959). Distribution: Indonesia (Java) ( Brug 1939).

subspecies notoscriptus ( Skuse, 1889) —original combination: Culex notoscriptus . Distribution: Australia, Indonesia ( Moluccas, Western New Guinea), New Caledonia, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, United States (continental) ( Wilkerson et al. 2021, Philippines record unverified).

Brug (1939) described montanus as a variety of Aedes notoscriptus and Stone et al. (1959) treated it as a subspecies of notoscriptus . The two forms are widely allopatric. The typical form is restricted to the Australasian Region whereas montanus is only know from its type locality in western Java, which lies within the Oriental Region. Brug (1939) noted that he was greatly surprised “to find a specimen of A. notoscriptus (Skuse) when rearing larvae found in Lembang, Java ” because “this species was considered to be truly Australian, not being found further westward than in Saparoea, a small island near Ceram ( Moluccas).” The specimen, a male, differs from the typical form in having a much shorter and distally narrowed white stripe on the hindtibia, a longer gonostylus, the claspette with a longer filament and longer setae at the base of the claspette stem, and sternum IX with a different number of setae. Based on its allopatric distribution and morphological distinctions, montanus is undoubtedly a distinct species, which is hereby formally elevated to specific status: Aedes (Rampamyia) montanus Brug, 1939 . Aedes montanus is currently listed as a species in the Encyclopedia of Life.