New species and additional data on the chewing louse genus Myrsidea (Phthiraptera: Menoponidae) from wild Neotropical Passeriformes (Aves)
Author
Kolencik, Stanislav
Author
Sychra, Oldrich
Author
Papousek, Ivo
Author
Kuabara, Kamila M. D.
Author
Valim, Michel P.
Author
Literak, Ivan
text
Zootaxa
2018
4418
5
401
431
journal article
30109
10.11646/zootaxa.4418.5.1
fe001114-35af-46d5-bab4-4ab21689cdc6
1175-5326
1244956
04FEA195-71DA-4C7E-A62B-A658CFCF6B0C
Myrsidea
sp. 1
Material
examined.
Ex
Taraba major
(Vieillot, 1816)
—great antshrike:
1♀
,
Los Tres Gigantes Biological Station
in the
Paraguayan Pantanal
,
Paraguay
(
20°04'S
,
50°09'W
),
7 September 2012
,
I. Literak
(
MMBC
).
Remarks.
This is the first record of a chewing louse from
Taraba major
.
Our female is close to
Myrsidea dacostai
Price, Johnson & Dalgleish, 2008
from
Thamnophilus doliatus
(Linnaeus, 1764)
, although it is considerably larger than specimens from the
type
host in almost all dimensions. This size discrepancy could be the result of a correlation with the size differences between the two hosts:
Taraba major
with length
19–20cm
and weight
50–70g
against
Thamnophilus doliatus
with length
15–16cm
and weight
24–30g
(see
Zimmer & Isler 2003
). Such correlation of host and louse size within a given louse genus is known as Harrison’s Rule (Price
et al.
2003). Furthermore, both
Taraba major
and
Thamnophilus doliatus
have almost the same geographical distribution (
Clements
et al.
2017
). More data are necessary to test if these differences are due to intraspecific variation or if our female represents another, distinct, species.
Our specimen differs from the original description of
M. dacostai
by setal counts and dimensions, as follows [data from
Price
et al.
(2008b)
are in parentheses]:
Female (n = 1).
Metanotum with 7 (5–6) marginal setae. Tergal setae: I, 15 (12–14); III, 17 (11–14). Sternal setae: II, 11 (14–16) marginal setae between asters, 3 (8–9) medioanterior setae. Anal fringe formed by 51 (44–50) dorsal and 40 (45–47) ventral setae. Dimensions: TW, 0.53 (0.49–0.50); HL, 0.37 (0.33–0.34); MW, 0.52 (0.48– 0.51); TL, 1.75 (1.58–1.66).