Hishimonus Ishihara

Viraktamath, C. A. & Anantha Murthy, H. V., 2014, Review of the genera Hishimonus Ishihara and Litura Knight (Hemiptera: Cicadellidae) from the Indian subcontinent with description of new species, Zootaxa 3785 (2), pp. 101-138 : 104-105

Hishimonus Ishihara

Hishimonus Ishihara 1953: 10 . Type species: Thamnotettix sellata Uhler , by original designation.

Description. (Modified from Knight 1970a and Dai et al. 2013) Small leafhoppers, 3.0–4.0 mm long, yellow in colour, sometimes marked with brown, legs and venter stramineous, forewings silvery white with dark brown mottling and large brown semicircular spot against midlength of commissural margin forming, when wings at rest, conspicuous circular or diamond shaped spot with that of opposite wing (henceforth called median spot).

Head as broad as pronotum or broader, slightly longer medially than next to eye with anterior margin broadly rounded; narrowly rounded to face; frontoclypeus longer than wide; clypeal sulcus distinct; clypellus elongate with sides parallel over basal 0.66, slightly expanded at apex; genal margins concave beneath eyes; ocelli on anterior margin, contiguous with eyes or separated by a distance less than own diameter; a shallow transverse furrow on vertex between ocelli; vertex posterior to furrow glabrous, face and vertex anterior to furrow shagreened. Pronotum approximately twice length of vertex, sides short, posterior margin transverse or shallowly concave; surface glabrous, transversely and feebly striate. Scutum and scutellum together shorter than pronotum. Forewings with claval veins joined by cross vein at midlength; inner subapical cell open basally, outer subapical cell elongate with ends transverse; appendix small. Fore femur with setal arrangement as follows: 2 AD at apex, well developed AM1, 9–13 IC, 6–8 PV and 12–13 short AV. Fore tibia with 1+4 (AD+PD) setae. Hind femoral apical setal formula 2+2+1.

Male pygofer acutely rounded posteriorly, with stout setae over posterior half, without processes; dorsal surface approximately 0.33 of total length. Subgenital plate tapering posteriorly to membranous fingerlike process (except H. indicus and H. viraktamathi ), uniseriate row of stout setae laterally, becoming multiseriate basally, with a more lateral row of long filamentous setae over apical half. Connective Y-shaped with stem long or short. Styles terminating in posteriorly directed fingerlike process, subapical lobe present. Aedeagus with two dorsally directed shafts each with gonopore near apex, with or without basal processes. Female with gonocoxa I usually broader than width of first pair of valvulae at base. Sculpturing of first pair of valvulae imbricate and reaching dorsal margin. Teeth on second pair of valvulae in apical 0.33 length, without dorsal median tooth.

Remarks. Hishimonus differs from Hishimonoides , Litura and Naevus Knight with which it is closely related in possessing neither preatrial processes of the aedeagus (sometimes referred to as paraphyses) nor with a ventrally extended preatriumwithout process. Some species of Hishimonus , such as H. indicus (Sohi) and H. viraktamathi Knight , have basal processes to the aedeagus, which resemble the preatrial process of Litura and their assignment to this genus is only provisional. The following key will separate the four genera under discussion.