Neoascia guttata Skevington and Moran

Skevington, Jeffrey H., Young, Andrew D., Locke, Michelle M. & Moran, Kevin M., 2019, New Syrphidae (Diptera) of North-eastern North America, Biodiversity Data Journal 7, pp. 36673-36673 : 36673

Neoascia guttata Skevington and Moran sp. n.

Materials

Type status: Holotype. Occurrence: catalogNumber: CNC_Diptera170046 ; recordedBy: D.M. Wood; individualCount: 1; sex: male; lifeStage: adult; Taxon: scientificName: Neoasciaguttata Skevington and Moran; kingdom: Animalia; phylum: Arthropoda; class: Hexapoda; order: Diptera; family: Syrphidae; genus: Neoascia; subgenus: Neoasciella; specificEpithet: guttata; taxonRank: species; scientificNameAuthorship: Skevington and Moran 2019; vernacularName: Spotted Fen Fly; nomenclaturalStatus: new species; Location: country: Canada; stateProvince: Nova Scotia; locality: Lawrencetown, Halifax County ; decimalLatitude: 44.644175; decimalLongitude: -63.344633; Identification: identifiedBy: J.H. Skevington; Event: samplingProtocol: hand collected; eventDate: 1967-07-19/20; year: 1967; month: 7; day: 19; verbatimEventDate: 19-20.vii.1967; Record Level: language: en; institutionCode: CNC; basisOfRecord: PreservedSpecimen Type status: Paratype. Occurrence: catalogNumber: CNC_Diptera169737 ; recordedBy: W.R.M. Mason; individualCount: 1; sex: female; lifeStage: adult; Taxon: scientificName: Neoasciaguttata Skevington and Moran; kingdom: Animalia; phylum: Arthropoda; class: Hexapoda; order: Diptera; family: Syrphidae; genus: Neoascia; subgenus: Neoasciella; specificEpithet: guttata; taxonRank: species; scientificNameAuthorship: Skevington and Moran 2019; vernacularName: Spotted Fen Fly; nomenclaturalStatus: new species; Location: country: Canada; stateProvince: Alberta; locality: Jumping Pound Creek, 20 miles West of Calgary ; decimalLatitude: 51.040727; decimalLongitude: -114.753223; Identification: identifiedBy: K. Moran; Event: samplingProtocol: hand collected; eventDate: 1962-06-23; year: 1962; month: 6; day: 23; verbatimEventDate: 23.vi.1962; Record Level: language: en; institutionCode: CNC; basisOfRecord: PreservedSpecimen Type status: Paratype. Occurrence: catalogNumber: CNC_Diptera169738 ; recordedBy: C.B.D. Garrett; individualCount: 1; sex: female; lifeStage: adult; Taxon: scientificName: Neoasciaguttata Skevington and Moran; kingdom: Animalia; phylum: Arthropoda; class: Hexapoda; order: Diptera; family: Syrphidae; genus: Neoascia; subgenus: Neoasciella; specificEpithet: guttata; taxonRank: species; scientificNameAuthorship: Skevington and Moran 2019; vernacularName: Spotted Fen Fly; nomenclaturalStatus: new species; Location: country: Canada; stateProvince: Alberta; locality: Banff ; decimalLatitude: 51.18; decimalLongitude: -115.57; Identification: identifiedBy: K. Moran; Event: samplingProtocol: hand collected; eventDate: 1922-06-2; year: 1922; month: 6; day: 2; verbatimEventDate: 2.vi.1922; Record Level: language: en; institutionCode: CNC; basisOfRecord: PreservedSpecimen

Description

Size: Body length 4.7 to 5.0 mm; wing length 3.8 to 4.4 mm

Male: Head: Black with metallic sheen; face yellowish pollinose and white pilose; gena sparsely pollinose and pilose posteriorly; frons shiny, rugose, white pilose on ventral ⅔, black pilose dorsally; vertex shiny, smooth, pale pilose; occiput sparsely grey pollinose and black pilose dorsally, becoming densely silvery white pollinose and white pilose ventrally; antenna dark brown except orange basoventral ⅓ of postpedicel; postpedicel short, about as long as wide; arista slightly longer than postpedicel.

Thorax: Black with metallic sheen; postpronotum shiny, yellowish-white pilose; mesonotum shiny, yellowish-white pilose; scutellum shiny, yellowish-white pilose; pleuron greyish-white pollinose except shiny on most of katepisternum, meron and katatergite; katepisternum with a few white pili dorsally; meron bare; katatergite white pilose; postmetacoxal bridge absent; coxae dark brown, greyish-white pollinose, white and black pilose; trochanters orange; pro- and mesofemora narrowly orange basally and apically, black elsewhere, white pilose; pro- and mesotibiae and tarsi similar with a bit more orange basally; metafemur orange on basal ⅕ and narrowly on apex, black elsewhere, black pilose; metatibia orange on basal ⅓ and on apical tip, black medially, white pilose; tarsi bicoloured, pale pilose; basitarsomere brown except orange apically; 2nd and 3rd tarsomeres orange; apical 2 tarsomeres brown; calypter white; halter white; wing lightly infuscate, completely microtrichose.

Abdomen: Black except with paired orange spots proximally on 3rd tergite, with metallic sheen, white pilose.

Genitalia: Male terminalia black pilose; epandrium compact, about same length as surstylus; cercus elongate, protruding; surstylus broad and elongate, with a few large bristles on the dorsal proximal corner; distiphallus simple, bag-like; hypandrium elongate; postgonite simple; phallapodeme straight; ejaculatory apodeme tiny, parasol-shaped.

Female: Similar to male except for normal sexual dimorphism and the following: abdomen completely black (spots absent); metatarsi entirely black.

See Fig. 11.

Diagnosis

Postmetacoxal bridge absent. Face long and straight, different from shorter, concave face found in similar species. Paired spots on tergite 4 of male. Male cerci protruding; surstyli broad and elongate.

Etymology

This name is from the Latin guttata , meaning dappled, speckled, spotted.

Distribution

This species is known from a single male collected on 19-20 July 1967 in Lawrencetown, Nova Scotia by Monty Wood and two females from Alberta.

Ecology

This rare fly has been collected from early June to mid-July.

Taxon discussion

The unique face shape (long and straight) suggests that these females are correctly associated with the males. DNA evidence (Table 2 ) corroborates this. As the abdominal pattern varies in Neoascia , it is possible that further dissections will turn up more specimens of this species that are masquerading as other species. DNA barcodes suggest that this species is closely related to the North African species N. clausseni Hauser and Kassebeer 1998. The shape of the face is identical in these two species, but the abdominal pattern and male genitalia are different.

Common Name

The common name given to the species by Skevington et al. (2019) is Spotted Fen Fly.