Quichuana picadoi, KNAB, 1913: 14

Ricarte, Antonio, Marcos-García, M. Ángeles, Hancock, E. G. & Rotheray, Graham E., 2012, Revision of the New World genus Quichuana Knab, 1913 (Diptera: Syrphidae), including descriptions of 24 new species, Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society (Zool. J. Linn. Soc.) 166 (1), pp. 72-131 : 106-107

QUICHUANA PICADOI KNAB, 1913: 14

FIGURES 75 AND 76

The type is a female mounted after having been preserved in ‘spirits’ and attacked by Dermestidae ( Knab, 1913) . On the abdomen, only part of tergum I is left. The type is labelled as follows: II 6 ai (handwritten)/ Costa Rica,?... large bracket and then ... Orosi, Cartago, Estrella (handwritten by Knab)/ Bred, epiphytic, bromeliad, C. Picado (handwritten by Knab)/Type, no. 15504, USNM (red label)/ Quichuana , picadoi, Knab (handwritten by Knab) (USNM). We have examined females of Quichuana from Trinidad with the same combination of characters displayed by the holotype of Q. picadoi , as well as fitting to the original description in Knab (1913) and the diagnostic features provided by Hull (1946). Males of Q. picadoi were recognized because they were collected in the same localities as these females, and because of the similar morphology.

Description

Male (previously undescribed)

Head: Eye hairs lighter and shorter further down the eye; ocellar triangle with long, black hairs; vertical triangle with pollinosity restricted to the anterior corner; frontal triangle shiny black, with long, black hairs centrally, and whitish hairs on the eye margin; basoflagellomere elongate (bf = 2.5–3, N = 8), nearly 2 ¥ longer than the pedicel; basoflagellomere and pedicel pollinose; basoflagellomere black to dark brown; face pollinose, with a central, shiny stripe and two lateral, shiny stripes wider than the central stripe; lower part of the face with long, pale hairs in a beard arrangement, conspicuously exceeding the mouth edge ( Figs 75, 76 ); facial hairs, including the ‘beard’ hairs, silver white to yellowish white.

Thorax: Only with yellow to whitish hairs; scutum with two pollinose, narrow, approximated stripes, diverging slightly posteriorly; NP, PAPT posterodorsally, and PC with tufts of hairs; legs extensively yellow, except for the dark coxae, trochanters, and restricted parts of the metafemur, tibiae, and tarsi; wings extensively microtrichose; alula microtrichose, except for a bare semicircular area on the anterior margin.

Abdomen: Tergum I with a moustache arrangement of usually yellow hairs; terga II–IV yellow haired, except for the posterior margin that has a semicircular band of black hairs; on terga II–III the length of this band is a quarter of the tergum length, and on tergum IV it is about a half of the tergum length; lateral margins of terga II–IV only with pale hairs.

Genitalia: Virtually the same as that in Q. angustiventris ( Fig. 5–7 ).

Diagnostic features

Female

Holotype: Basoflagellomere elongate (bf = 2.2); face with two lateral, wide, shiny stripes; face with silver white hairs, absent on the central, shiny stripe; vertex with black hairs around the ocellar triangle; wing very weakly pigmented, almost hyaline; laterally directed, densely-grouped, yellow hairs are visible on the left part of tergum I. Hull (1946) provides some notes based on the damaged type, including a mention of the abdominal pilosity, but there is no reference to tergum II. Hull (1946) states that the black hairs are restricted to the posterior quarter of terga III and IV, and tergum V has yellow hairs.

Additional features based on other females examined: Frons with an anteriorly directed chevron of pollinosity; chevron with erect, usually silver white to yellow hairs; area between the vertex and the V-shaped band with erect, dark-brown to black hairs; dorsal side of the frontal prominence with anteriorly directed, pale hairs, sometimes intermixed with dark-brown to black hairs; basoflagellomere elongate (bf = 2.1–2.4, N = 7); hairs on face of the same colour as those in the holotype; thorax extensively white to yellow haired, except for the short, black hairs above the wings and, occasionally, the black hairs on PC anteriorly and on the area immediately posterior to TS; NP, PAPT posterodorsally, and PC with not very dense tufts of hair; microtrichia in alula as that in males; tergum I pale haired; posterior margin of terga II–IV with black hairs extending on the same, or about the same, proportion as those in males.

Material examined

Holotype of Q. picadoi (see data above).

Additional material: COSTA RICA: 4m, Puntarenas, Rincón de Osa, Tropical Science Center Field Station , leg. Richard P. Seifert, det. as Quichuana picadoi by FCT 1978 ( USNM ENT 00036233 , 00036234 , 00036236 , and 00036237) ( USNM); 2f, Prov. Puntarenas, Golfito, P.N. Corcovado, S. Los Patos, R . Rincón. S. Patos, 200 m, 11–24.i.1999, leg. M. Lobo, by hand net, L S 278700 561700#53871 ( INB0003044705 and 0003044708) ( INBio) .

MEXICO: 2f, Los Tuxtlas , larva 22.viii.2000, missing puparia, adult 20.ix.2000, ex Heliconia , leg. J. R. Verdú, det. as Quichuana by M. Louis ( CEUA) .

TRINIDAD: 1f with puparium, Valencia, Trinidad B.W.I., vii.1954, ex floral bracts of Heliconia bihai , leg. P.A. Buxton., det. as Quichuana knabi by N.P. Wyatt 1986 ( NHM); 3m (1m with puparium, 1m still inside the open puparium, and 1m caught as adult) & 2f (missing puparia), Simla, nr. Arima, 21.vi- 6.vii.2007, ex Heliconia , leg. EGH (Entry n°448); 1m, Chaguaramas, larva 3.vii.1998, puparium 4.vii.1998, larva 11.vii.1998), ex Heliconia , missing leg.; 1m, Mt Harris, ex Heliconia tortuosa , date of larva collection unrecorded, puparium 12.viii.1998, adult 23.viii.1998 (attacked by Anthrenus , only head and four legs left); 1f with puparium, Chaguaramas, larva 13.vii.1998, pupariation date unrecorded, adult 22.vii.1998; 5f (3f with puparia, 2f without puparia), Mt Harris, Phrm Rd (2f), ex Heliconia tortuosa , puparium 8.viii.1998 & adult 17.viii.1998, puparium 12. viii.1998 & adult 20.viii.1998, larva 29.vii.1998, pupariation date unrecorded & adult 5.ix.1998, date of larva collection unrecorded, puparium 8.viii.1998 & adult 17.viii.1998, date of larva collection unrecorded, puparium 8.viii.1998 & adult 16.viii.1998, leg. Gl. Univ. Epdtn ( HM).

Range

Colombia, Costa Rica, Mexico, Trinidad and Surinam (specimens from Menno Reemer).

Taxonomic notes

Medium size species (10.7–11.9 mm, N = 10 males) with slender abdomen; males can be distinguished from those of all other species by the presence of a ‘beard’ of long, pale hairs about the mouth edge ( Figs 75, 76 ), and females can be distinguished by the face with two lateral, shiny stripes, which are complete, unlike females of Q. angustiventris , and the hairs on the face being silver white, which are golden yellow in Q. subcostalis ; however, other females similar to Q. picadoi are those of Q. sepiapennis and Q. sylvicola ; these females are separated from females of Q. picadoi by the alula; in Q. picadoi the alula is microtrichose, except for a bare semicircular area on the anterior margin, whereas in Q. sepiapennis the alula is almost bare, with microtrichia only forming a narrow band along the posterior margin and a patch at the base of the alula, whereas in Q. sylvicola , the alula is completely microtrichose.

Females showed variability in certain head characters. Females collected from Mt Harris , Chaguaramus, and Valencia in Trinidad have long hairs exceeding the mouth edge, but never as much as in males; females from Costa Rica, Mexico, and other sites in Trinidad lacked such long hairs or had hairs only slightly longer than the mouth edge; in some females from Costa Rica and Trinidad, the facial, lateral, shiny stripes are as wide as those in males and the female holotype , whereas in Mexican and other Costa Rican females, lateral stripes were narrower than those of males and the female holotype .

QUICHUANA POGONOSA FLUKE, 1937

Figures

Figures 73–79. Features of the ‘slender’ and ‘robust’ species of Quichuana. 73–76, ‘slender’ species. 73, Quichuana angustiventris, male from Trinidad with attached puparium, overall appearance, dorsal view; scale bar = 2 mm. 74, Quichuana calathea, male from Costa Rica, eye contiguity and vertical triangle; scale bar = 0.5 mm. 75–76, Quichuana picadoi, male: 75, anterior view; 76, lateral view; scale bar = 1 mm. 77–79, ‘robust’ species. 77, Quichuana fasciata, female lectotype, overall appearance, dorsal view; scale bar = 2 mm. 78, Quichuana dissimilis sp. nov., male holotype, eye contiguity and vertical triangle; scale bar = 1 mm. 79, Quichuana atra sp. nov., female, anterior view; scale bar = 1 mm.

Figures 5–8. Quichuana male genitalia. 5–7, Quichuana angustiventris: 5, hypandrium, lateral view; 6, epandrium, lateral view; 7, left half of epandrium, anterior view. 8, Quichuana longicauda sp. nov., apical part of hypandrium, lateral view. Scale bars: 0.5 mm.