Belonuchus weiserianus ( Bernhauer, 1921 ) Chani-Posse, 2010

Chani-Posse, Mariana, 2010, Revision of the southern South American species of Philonthus Stephens (Coleoptera: Staphylinidae) 2595, Zootaxa 2595, pp. 1-70 : 8

Belonuchus weiserianus ( Bernhauer, 1921) , comb. n.

Philonthus weiserianus "Bernhauer in litt."; Bruch, 1915: 445 (catalog). Nomen nudum.

Philonthus weiserianus Bernhauer, 1921: 106 ; Scheerpeltz, 1933: 1368 (catalog) Blackwelder, 1944: 135 (list); Herman, 2001b: 3003 (catalog); Chani-Posse, 2004: 232 (list)

Type material. Lectotype (here designated), ♀, with labels: “Rep. Argentina / Prov. Jujuy / 30.XI.1919 / C. Bruch”, “Hornadita/3400/ Weiser”, “ weiserianus Bernh. / Typus ♀ ” (yellow label), “Chicago NHMus. /M. Bernhauer Collection” “ Lectotype Philonthus weiserianus Bernhauer, 1921 / Des. Chani-Posse de Maus 2008 ” ( FMNH).

Notes. I designate the lectotype of P. weiserianus rather than assume that the exmined type specimen is the holotype since in the original description Bernhauer (1921) gave no information about the number of specimens examined. Therefore, it is possible that this name was based on more than one specimen ( ICZN 1999, Recommendation 73F). The lectotype agrees with the description by Bernhauer (1921).

Additional material: ARGENTINA: Jujuy: Hornadita, 10.20, Weiser , 3400m, 1 ♀, ( NMPC) .

My examination of the type material of Philonthus aluticollis , P. flavicoxis , and P. weiserianus established that these three species do not belong to the genus Philonthus but belong to the genus Belonuchus Nordmann. In Smetana´s (1995) key to Holarctic genera of Philonthina , these species will go to couplet 12, where they share with Belonuchus the “first four segments of front tarsus with ventral face bearing only regular, unmodified marginal setae; each simple, not dilated” and “lateral puncture of pronotum, bearing long seta, situated away from superior line of pronotal hypomeron, separated from it by distance at least three times as large as diameter of puncture”. Additionally, both P. aluticollis and P. flavicoxis ( P. weiserianus , male unknown) show “parameres fused into one solid sclerite, lacking sensory peg setae, usually markedly reduced to short plate semifused with median lobe” as stated by Smetana (1995) for Belonuchus and also recognized by Chani-Posse de Maus (2008) for Endeius Coiffait and Sáiz. While this character seems to be common in Belonuchus , it may rarely appear in Philonthus ( Smetana 1995) . Up to this date, I have no information about the presence of such condition in Bisnius . On the other hand, Philonthus aluticollis , P. flavicoxis , and P. weiserianus differ from species belonging to Gabrius and Endeius by having the “last segment of labial palpus not appreciably narrower than preceding segment”.