Vartiania gallagheri, Yakovlev, 2021

Yakovlev, R. V., 2021, New data on the genus Vartiania Yakovlev, 2004 (Lepidoptera: Cossidae, Cossinae), Far Eastern Entomologist 429, pp. 1-7 : 4-6

Vartiania gallagheri sp. n.

http://zoobank.org/NomenclaturalActs/ DE392597-A458-42D5-A072-35C35BB471BA

Figs 5 , 8

TYPE MATERIAL. Holotype – male, Oman: 5917, Khor Barr All , Aikman,

20º40′ N, 58º40′ E, 2.XI [19]79, M.D. Gallagher ( NHMUK; individual number

NHMUK: 012832467, slide: 010315498).

DESCRIPTION. Length of fore wing 17 mm. Antenna simple, belt-like, not pectinate. Fore wing light-grey with thin pattern of black undulated transverse lines postdiscally and submarginally. Hind wing of milk-and-coffee color, without pattern,

only in anal angle area poor sputtering of black scales.

Male genitalia. Uncus absent, probably due to a mechanical damage of the caudal end of dry specimen abdomen. Gnathos arms thin, relatively short, gnathos compact,

covered with small spikes; valve with membranous lanceolate caudal end, with small denticle of costal edge (in zone of transition of sclerotized basal part into membranous caudal part); juxta robust, saddle-like, with short thick lateral processes diverged at an angle of 180º; saccus very robust, semicircular; phallus very thick, straight, of almost even thickness throughout all length, abdominal end spear-likely sharpened,

spiky processes on vesica aperture edges, vesica aperture in dorso-apical position,

equals to 1/3 of phallus in length.

DIAGNOSIS. The new species is most similar to the south-Iranian V. zaratustra

Yakovlev, 2004, from which it clearly differs in a series of characters in the male genitalia: the relatively long membranous caudal end of the valve (the membranous edge is very short in V. zaratustra ), the lateral processes of the juxta diverged at an angle of 180º (lateral processes in V. zaratustra diverged at an acute angle).

DISTRIBUTION. Oman (Al Wusta Region).

ETYMOLOGY. The new species is named after its collector, the British officer

Michael Desmond Gallagher (1921−2014), a well-known nature explorer of the

Arabian Peninsula, preferably, birds of Oman, the director of Natural History Museum in Muscat, author of several monographs and articles about the animal world of the region (Eriksen, 2014).

Figures

Figs 1–5. Adult males of Vartiania spp. 1–3 – V. muscula (Rothschild, 1912): 1 – ho-

Figs 6–8. Male genitalia of Vartiania spp. 6 – V. muscula (Rothschild, 1912) from Baigacum (ZISP); 7 – V. belli sp. n., holotype (NHMUK); 8 – V. gallagheri sp. n., holotype