Airapus rakovici Kral & Lu 2021, new species
Creators: name: Král, David
name: Lu, Yuanyuan
name: Bai, Ming
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2021
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Arthropoda
Insecta
Coleoptera
Aphodiidae
Airapus
Airapus rakovici

description: Airapus rakovici Král & Lu, new species [XMŧūøƃ]
(Figs. 1–9)
Type locality. China, Fujian, Nanping, Wu Yi Shan Mts., Sangang, Forest Ecological Station, 890 m, 27°42'23.6"N, 117°45'15.9"E (see Figs. 6–9).
Type material. China, Fujian: Holotype, ♂, “ ēs.Ŧfflẋƛm | ÷ ƗÈ ữü | 2009.VI.30 | Nħflx | • Bn'+Ľëssffi || Fujian, Nanping, Wu Yi Shan | Sangang, Forest Ecological Station | 2009.VI.30 | Xiushuai Yang lgt. [printed]”. Deposited in the Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.
Description of holotype (♂). Oblong oval, subparallel, only slightly broader posteriad, moderately convex, moderately shining, dark blackish brown, anterior clypeus margin, anterior pronotal angles and sutural interval of elytra brown. Dorsal surface almost bare, microscopical setae only in approximately apical third (Figs. 1–3).
Head (Figs. 1, 3) moderately convex, without visible frontoclypeal suture; head surface with mostly longitudinal punctures. Clypeus dentate each side of wide anteromedian emargination, its lateral sides nearly aligned with anterior margins of genae. Genae rounded, large, considerably exceeding eyes.
Pronotum (Figs. 1, 3) transversal, considerably wider than head, widest before posterior angles, with nearly straight sides, rounded anterior angles and moderately rounded posterior angles. Pronotum surface regularly coarsely and densely punctate; punctures largest basally and stepwise decreasing in size toward anterior margin. Pronotum lateral margins smooth, glabrous.
Scutellum small, narrow, triangular (Fig. 1).
Elytra (Figs. 1, 3) with 10 striae and 10 intervals, with distinct humeral denticles, elongate, only slightly broader posteriad (broadest point behind half elytra length). Striae narrow, with punctures distinctly observable under high magnification only, but crenating intervals. Intervals wider, weakly costate, reticulate.
Legs in dorsal view (Figs. 1–3): protibia with three large teeth in anterior part of outer margin, not denticulate in basal part, its upper surface smooth impunctate, apical spur about as long as basal protarsomere; basal meso- and metatarsomeres long, longer than superior terminal spurs of mesotibia and metatibia, respectively.
Ventral surfaces (Fig. 2) shining, remarkably coarsely punctate, punctures on femora smaller than those on mesometaventum and abdominal ventrites. Median furrow of meso-metaventral plate nearly complete as shown in Fig. 2. Abdominal ventrites fluted anteriorly and/or posteriorly as in Fig. 2.
Aedeagus as in Figs. 4–5.
Measurements. Total body length of 5.8 mm.
Name derivation. Patronymic; named in honour of our colleague Miloslav Rakovič
(Dobřichovice, Czech Republic), an outstanding specialist on Aphodiinae, especially on
Psammodiini.
Collecting events. Collected from a light trap in the Forest Ecological Station in Wuyishan, which is surrounded by naturally growing vegetation with dominant trees of Castanopsis carlesii, C. eyrei and C. fargesii (Fagaceae). The nearby mountain ridge is covered with mostly coniferous forest. The soil nearby is composed from red and yellowish red soils (Figs. 6–9).
Differential diagnosis. The new species is classified in the genus Airapus by the following set of synapomorphies: pronotal sides distinctly explanate; meso-metaventrum weakly convex or flat with variously shaped callosities; mesocoxae widely separated, flattened, parallel or subparallel; elytral intervals smooth or irregularly swollen; meso- and metatibiae straight with longitudinal lines (for details see also Stebnicka & Howden 1996 and Rakovič et al. 2019). It is distinguished from other south-eastern Asian species mainly by different sculpture of dorsal surface. In the key to Airapus species (Král et al. 2019), A. rakovici Král & Lu, new species will key to the couplet with A. jenisi Král, Mencl & Rakovič, 2019 and A. sumatrae (Fairmaire, 1896) but can be separated from the the fromer by pronotum remarkably simply and coarsely punctate, absence of oblique prontal impressions and elytral intervals impunctate (Figs. 1, 3) (pronotum with medium-sized punctures intermixed with fine ones, pronotal oblique impressions present and elytral punctures fine but distinct in A. jenisi, see Král et al. 2019, figs. 20–21 and 23–26) and from the latter by absence of oblique prontal impressions and posterior pronotal angles rather rounded (Figs. 1, 3) (oblique prontal impressions present and posterior pronotal angles truncate in A. sumatrae).
Distribution. China: Fujian.
description: Published as part of Král, David, Lu, Yuanyuan & Bai, Ming, 2021, Airapus rakovici (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae: Aphodiinae: Eupariini), a new species from Fujian, China, pp. 140-144 in Zootaxa 4920 (1) on pages 140-144, DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.4920.1.8, http://zenodo.org/record/4472376