Triraphis kardia Jasso-Martínez, Zaldívar-Riverón & Martínez, 2024

Jasso-Martínez, Jovana M., Martínez, Juan José, Aguilar-Velasco, Reina Gabriela & Zaldívar-Riverón, Alejandro, 2024, Four new species of Triraphis Ruthe, 1855 (Braconidae, Rogadinae) from a Mexican tropical dry forest and morphological descriptions of T. bradzlotnicki Sharkey, 2021 and T. davidwahli Sharkey, 2021, European Journal of Taxonomy 917, pp. 50-73 : 53-56

Triraphis kardia Jasso-Martínez, Zaldívar-Riverón & Martínez sp. nov.

urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:CA60FAE3-3375-431C-A6A1-EF27E49D333A

Fig. 1

Diagnosis

Triraphis kardia sp. nov. can be distinguished from the remaining species of the genus by having a ʻheart-shapedʼ brown patch on the first metasomal tergite ( Fig. 1E–F ). Triraphis kardia sp. nov. keyed to T. balteus Valerio, 2015 following Valerio & Shaw’s (2015) key to species of Triraphis from Costa Rica; however, it can be distinguished from the latter species by having a color pattern of metasoma with brown patches in the median area of most tergites (absent in T. balteus ), a coriaceous metapleuron (granulate and rugose in T. balteus ), and its yellow color of hind tibia and tarsi (dark brown in T. balteus ).

Etymology

The name of this new species refers to the Greek word ʻ kardia ʼ (ʻheartʼ), due to the ʻheart-shapedʼ brown patch on the first metasomal tergite. This specific epithet is in apposition.

Material examined

Holotype

MEXICO • ♀; Jalisco, Chamela Biological Station UNAM , Camino Chachalaca, near lab, Cham006B; 19.4981° N, 105.0444° W; 95 m a.s.l.; 25–26 Nov. 2009; H. Clebsch, A. Zaldívar and A. Polaszck leg.; light trap; DNA voucher no. CNIN958 ; GenBank accession no. OQ868172 ; CNIN-IBUNAM.

Paratype

MEXICO • 1 ♀; Jalisco, Chamela Biological Station UNAM , Camino Búho, Cham008B; 19.49885° N, 105.04041° W; 25–26 Nov. 2009; H. Clebsch, A. Zaldívar and A. Polaszck leg.; light trap; DNA voucher no. CNIN933 ; GenBank accession no. OQ868171 ; CNIN-IBUNAM.

Description

Female (holotype)

MEASUREMENTS. Body length 4.8 mm; fore wing length 3.85 mm; ovipositor 1 mm.

COLOR. Head honey yellow; eyes silverish brown; ocelli with a fine whitish yellow line around edges, ocelar triangle dark brown; mandibles pale yellow, tooth brown; scape, pedicel and basal flagellomeres honey yellow, turning brown to apex; median and lateral mesoscutal lobes honey yellow, median area of median and inner parts of lateral mesoscutal lobes pale yellow; scutellum pale yellow, with a dark brown transversal band apically; metanotum pale yellow with a median dark brown spot apically; legs pale yellow, hind femur with brownish patches near the insertion with tibia; apical tarsomere dark brown; tarsal claws brown. Fore and hind wings hyaline, pterostigma brown medially, pale yellow on both edges, veins pale yellow to brown (hind: 2RS, r, 1M, apical MCU, basal 1CU, 3CU). Metasomal tergites pale yellow; first metasomal tergite with a ʻheart-shapedʼ brown patch; median dark brown area running from apical part of second to fifth metasomal tergites. Ovipositor and ovipositor sheaths honey yellow.

HEAD. Head 1.6 times wider than its median length (dorsal view); distance between basal edges of tentorial pits and the basal area of toruli 0.7 times maximum width of face; width of oral opening 1.7 times its height. Vertex, temple, and gena mostly smooth; frons transversally striated near toruli, remaining areas mostly smooth; face with irregular to transverse weak rugae, with sparsely long setae, with a median longitudinal swollen area; clypeus poorly defined, weakly sculptured, nearly smooth; malar suture present. Antennae with 32 flagellomeres; first flagellomere 1.6 times longer than wide, as long as second flagellomere; eye 1.5 times higher than broad; malar space 0.2 times height of eye; face width about 1.2 times height of eye, and about 2.0 times the height of face and clypeus combined; occipital carina complete, narrow dorsally; median ocellus as big as lateral ocelli; ocellus-eye distance about 0.5 lateral ocellus width.

MESOSOMA. Length of mesosoma 2.2 times its maximum width (dorsal view), 1.4 times its maximum height (lateral view); pronotal groove smooth and scrobiculate; propleuron smooth; median and lateral mesoscutal lobes smooth-colliculate; notauli scrobiculate, distinct, not meeting, medial pit present, elongate; mesopleuron smooth-colliculate, dorso-laterally costate; precoxal sulcus wide, deep, scrobiculate, running along two thirds of mesopleuron; metapleuron coriaceous, with a tubercle above mesocoxa; basal half of propodeum finely-coriaceous anteriorly, remaining area rugose; median carina about ¼ of propodeum length, areola triangular, poorly defined laterally.

LEGS. Hind coxa 1.3 times longer than wide. Length of hind femur 4.0 times its maximum width. Hind basitarsus 0.48 times as long as hind tibia. Length of hind basitarsus 0.7 times combined length of second to fifth tarsal segments. Second, third, fourth and fifth (without pretarsus) tarsal segments 0.4, 0.4, 0.2 and 0.4 times as long as basitarsus. Tarsal claws with a basal, pointed lobe, followed by sharp spines.

WINGS. Fore wing length 2.8 times its maximum width; pterostigma 2.7 times longer than wide; vein lCUb almost as long as vein RS+Ma; vein 3RSa 0.55 times vein 3RSb, 2.0 times vein r; angle at union 2RS and 2M acute. Hind wing length 4.3 times its maximum width; vein M+CU 1.2 times vein 1M and 3.0 times vein r-m; vein 1A 2.0 times vein cu-a.

METASOMA. Almost as long as head and mesosoma combined, with six visible tergites. First tergite, 0.9 times longer than its maximum width; maximum width 1.7 times its basal width; dorso-basal triangular area present; longitudinally costate with coriaceous to acinose sculpture between carinae and with a longitudinal median carina. Length of second tergite 0.7 times its maximum width, 1.8 times length of third tergite. Second to fourth metasomal tergites longitudinally costate with coriaceous to acinose sculpture between carinae; third and fourth tergites finely coriaceous apically. Remaining tergites finely coriaceous. Ovipositor about 0.4 times as long as metasoma.

Variation in females

Body length 4.5–4.8 mm; fore wing length 3.85–4.0 mm; ovipositor 0.7–1.0 mm. Specimen with complete antennae, 32 flagellomeres.

Males

Unknown.

Distribution

The type material was collected at the CBS in the state of Jalisco, Mexico, a region that is mainly composed of tropical dry forest.

Biology

Unknown.

Comments

The genus Triraphis was originally named as Triraphus by Ruthe (1855). However, the first name has been subsequently employed by different authors ( Shenefelt 1975; van Achterberg 1991) and here we have therefore decided to keep it for consistency.

One specimen of Triraphis in the BOLDSYSTEMS database (ASQBR994-20, locality labeled only as “ Mexico ”) appears to belong to T. kardia sp. nov., since it has a COI distance of 0.0–0.93% (Supp. file 5, Supp. file 6: Subset 5).

Figures

Fig. 1. Triraphis kardia Jasso-Martínez, Zaldívar-Riverón & Martínez sp. nov.; ♀, holotype (CNIN- IBUNAM). A. Lateral habitus. B. Head, frontal view. C. Mesosoma, lateral view. D. Wings. E. Head, mesosoma and first metasomal tergite, dorsal view. F. Metasoma, dorsal view.