Neodexiopsis fuscopunctata, Macquart, 1851

Pont, Adrian C., 2012, Muscoidea (Fanniidae, Anthomyiidae, Muscidae) described by P. J. M. Macquart (Insecta, Diptera), Zoosystema 34 (1), pp. 39-111 : 65

fuscopunctata Macquart, 1851 , Coenosia

Coenosia fuscopunctata Macquart, 1851b: 243 (1951d: 270) . Syntype (s) ♀ (♀), “de l’Amérique septentrionale. Collection de M. Hoffmeister, de Nordshausen.” (North America), not in MNHN or MHNL, and presumed destroyed.

MATERIAL. — Described from an unspecified number of ♀♀ in the collection of Pastor Hoffmeister of Nordhausen in Germany. No material of this species has been seen since, nor have I been able to locate any syntypes. Nordhausen is near Kassel, where there is a natural history museum, but there is no record of a Hoffmeister collection in that museum (F. Malec, pers. comm.). Further searches for Hoffmeister’s collection have been without success (R. Bährmann, pers. comm.), and it is believed to have been destroyed. I have seen a small number of Hoffmeister specimens in the ZMHU that came with the H. Loew collection, but no specimen labelled as Coenosia fuscopunctata was found.

CURRENT IDENTITY. — The name has been listed as an unrecognized species of Coenosia Meigen, 1826 ( Huckett 1965b: 877) . The reasons for this treatment have been discussed by Huckett (1934). He pointed out that Coenosia fuscopunctata of North American authors was the same as Neodexiopsis ovata (Stein, 1898) ( Huckett 1934: 71, 79), but he was unwilling to synonymize N. ovata formally with C. fuscopunctata , although there was nothing in the description of fuscopunctata to contradict such a course, because of the absence of the type ( Huckett 1934: 113). The situation is best resolved, if so desired, by the designation of a neotype for Coenosia fuscopunctata , within the framework of a revision of North American species of Neodexiopsis Malloch, 1920 .