Redescription of species of the Neotropical parasitoid Notiospathius Mathews et Marsh (Braconidae: Doryctinae) based on their nineteenth and early twentieth century types
Author
Zaldívar-Riverón, Alejandro
Author
Jesús-Bonilla, Vladimir Salvador De
text
Zootaxa
2010
2543
31
42
journal article
10.5281/zenodo.196736
9631f46d-532d-4a44-9ab4-97507bb09191
1175-5326
196736
Notiospathius
Matthews and Marsh, 1973
Type
species:
Stenophasmus terminalis
Ashmead, 1984
.
Comments
. This genus has a Neotropical distribution, with species recorded from Veracruz and Jalisco in central
Mexico
(Zaldívar-Riverón, unpubl. data) to the north, to northern
Argentina
to the south (J. J. Martínez, unpub. data). Species of
Notiospathius
are very similar to those of
Hansonorum
, and only can be distinguished from species of the latter genus by having the hind coxa with a tuberlce at the base (
Marsh, 2002
). A recent phylogenetic study, however, found that species of these two genera appeared intermingled within a single clade together with other doryctine genera with enlarged first metasomal tergite (Zaldívar- Riverón et al., 2008). Therefore, the presence of a tubercle in the hind coxa apparently has been gained and lossed in repeated occasions within the latter clade. Thus, further molecular and morphological studies will confirm whether
Hansonorum
must be synonymyzed with
Notiospathius
.
Notiospathius
is also morphologically similar to
Spathius
since both have an extremely petiolate, tubular first metasomal tergite, at least four times longer than apical width, with basal sternal plate 0.75 or more length of tergum. However, it can be distinguished from the latter genus by having: 1) fore wing with m-cu vein antefurcal and CU1a vein arising below the middle of first subdiscal cell; 2) hind wing with narrow basal cell, M-CU vein long, and absence of a weak development of the RS vein (
Matthews and Marsh, 1973
).
Marsh (2002)
provided a key for the species of
Notiospathius
from
Costa Rica
, which included 15 new species and three of the species recognized by
Matthews and Marsh (1973)
. The species of
Notiospathius
redescribed in this study and that are not in Marsh's (2002) key are added at the end of the redescriptions in its couplet 2 except for
N. sculpturatus
, which could not be included because its
holotype
lacks the metasoma. This updated key thus only misses four of the currently recognized species of the genus, three of which we could not examine their
holotypes
,
N. caudatus
(Szépligeti, 1902)
,
N. colombianus
(Enderlein, 1912)
, and
N. eleutherae
(Ashmead, 1892)
.