Rhagovelia brunae Magalhaes & Moreira, sp. nov.
Creators: name: Magalhães, Oséias Martins
name: Moreira, Felipe Ferraz Figueiredo
name: Galvão, Cleber
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2016
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Arthropoda
Insecta
Hemiptera
Veliidae
Rhagovelia
Rhagovelia brunae

description: Rhagovelia brunae Magalhães & Moreira sp. nov.
(Figs. 1–8, 11, 24; Table 1)
Rhagovelia amazonensis Gould, 1931: misidentification by Cunha et al. (2015): 427.
Apterous male (Figs. 1–2, 5–7, 11, 24, Table 1). General color black. Head with impressed longitudinal midline and a pair of oblique indentations at base shiny. Antenniferous tubercle dark brown, shiny. Antenna with proximal portion of antennomere I yellow and rest black. Eye black. Buccula and jugum yellow. Rostrum yellowish brown, becoming black towards apex. Pronotum black, with anterior 1/7 yellow. Metanotum black with greyish pubescence adjacent to posterior margin. Propleura yellow, black on posterior margin, covered by greyish pubescence; meso- and metapleura black, covered by greyish pubescence. Proepisternum, prosternum, and proacetabulum yellow. Meso- and metasterna black, covered by greyish pubescence; meso- and metacebula black on lateral surface, yellowish brown on mesal surface. Abdominal terga black, with broad greyish pubescence laterally on I, narrowly on II–III and V–VI, and totally covering IV; terga VII–VIII shiny. Abdominal laterotergites black on mesal portion, brown on lateral margin. Abdominal sterna black, except VII centrally brown. Coxae yellow. Fore and hind trochanters yellow; middle trochanter yellow at base, brown at apex. Fore and hind femora yellow at base, distally black; middle femur black. Tibiae and tarsi black.
Head short, with few long setae anteriorly and adjacent to mesal eye margin. Antenna covered by short brown setae; antennomeres I–II also with few thicker, longer setae. Antennomeres I–III cylindrical; I curved outwards; IV fusiform. Rostrum wide, reaching base of mesosternum. Jugum without black denticles.
Thorax dorsally covered by shiny, short setae. Pronotum long, with sparse circular punctations, posterior margin slightly convex, completely covering mesonotum, but exposing metanotum. Metanotum short, with posterior margin sinuous. Sides of thorax with circular punctations. Black denticles present in small numbers on proepisternum (Fig. 5), absent from thoracic sterna and acetabula. Legs covered by brown setae, more densely on trochanters, femora and tibiae; femora and tibiae also with rows of long, thicker, black setae. Fore tibia distally widened, with weak concavity near apex. Hind trochanter with 1–4 subequal spines and a longer spine (Fig. 7). Proximal third of hind femur with row of 10–14 short spines, the last one sometimes slightly longer than the others; distal 2/3 with two decreasing, parallel rows of spines; dorsalmost row with 7–9 spines, ventralmost row with 3–4 spines (Fig. 7). Hind tibia with two parallel rows of about 14–15 short, subequal spines and straight apical spur (Fig. 7).
Dorsum of abdomen covered by shiny setae, longer and more numerous on posterior segments. Abdominal terga I–VI wide and short, VII longest. Laterotergites elevated, tapering towards apex. Abdominal sterna with faint longitudinal median carina; black denticles present only on sides of segment VII; sternum VII declined on center of posterior margin. Proctiger expanded laterally at base, with apex rounded and covered by setae (Fig. 24); parameres symmetrical (Fig. 11).
Apterous female (Figs. 3–4, 8, Table 1). Similar to apterous male in color and structure, except: antenniferous tubercles brown; antennomere I with proximal portion yellow; rest of antenna dark brown to black; buccula and jugum yellow to brown. Abdominal terga black, I covered by greyish pubescence on margins, wider laterally, IV completely covered by greyish pubescence, VI–VIII shiny at least centrally; abdominal terga I–V short and wide, VI subquadrate, VII longest, VII–VIII with many short brown setae; gonocoxa with lateral tuft of curved, black setae. Trochanters unarmed. Hind femur with two rows of spines occupying most of length, dorsalmost row with 8–9 spines decreasing in size towards apex, sometimes with an extra short spine before longest spine, ventralmost row with two short spines near apex. Hind tibia with two parallel rows of short subequal spines and straight apical spur (Fig. 8).
Type material. All specimens apterous. HOLOTYPE ♂: BRAZIL, Pará State, Tailândia Municipality, Agropalma, Elaeis guineensis plantation, 2°33'53"S 48°43'33"W, 16.XII.2012, E. J. Cunha col. (MPEG). PARATYPES: same data as holotype (3♂, 6♀ MPEG). Same data except Agrovila, 2°32'25"S 48°47'57"W, 27.XI.2012 (5♀ MPEG). Same data except 2°36'14,0"S 48°44'21.0"W, 29.XI.2012 (6♂, 1♀ MPEG). Same data except Fazenda Roda de Fogo, 2°28'48"S 48°37'19"W, 15.XII.2012 (2♂, 1♀ MPEG). Same data except Agropar, 2°34'45"S 48°49'01"W, 12.XI.2012 (1♂, 9♀ MPEG). Same data except Fazenda Castanheira, 2°34'22"S 48°34'35"W, 14.XI.2012 (2♂, 3♀ MPEG). BRAZIL, Pará State, Moju Municipality, Amapalma, Elaeis guineensis plantation, 2°36'36"S 48°51'09"W, 19.XII.2012, E. J. Cunha col (8♂, 9♀ CEIOC). Same data except 2°40'13"S 48°55'31"W, 17.XII.2012 (2♂, 1♀ CEIOC).
Etymology. This species is dedicated to Bruna Coutinho Moura (2002–2016), who touched all of our hearts. She will not be forgotten.
Distribution and habitat. The collecting localities are a set of farms within the area of a palm oil company in the State of Pará, northern Brazil. The specimens were collected in streams with a width of 2 to 3 meters and depth of no more than 1 meter, located within Elaeis guineensis Jacquin (locally known as dendezeiro) plantations, and all with riparian forest of at least 30 meters.
Comments. Currently, only three other species of the robusta group share with R. brunae sp. nov. the presence of black denticles on the sides of abdominal sternum VII: R. jubata Bacon, 1948; R. palea Bacon, 1956; and R. sooretama Moreira, Nessimian & Rúdio, 2010. Rhagovelia palea and R. jubata share the presence of a large subapical spine on the male hind tibia and general body color light orange brown, whereas the large spine is absent and body mostly black in the other two species. The large spine of the male hind tibia can be undeveloped in some males of species in which it generally occurs, although it has never been found in populations of R. sooretama or R. brunae sp. nov.
Males of R. sooretama can be distinguished from those of R. brunae sp. nov. by the absence of spines on hind trochanter and presence of a medium spine between the proximal and distal rows of spines on the hind femur, whereas the new species has 1–4 subequal spines plus a longer spine on hind trochanter and lacks a medium spine between the basal and distal rows of spines on the hind femur. Rhagovelia brunae sp. nov. can be differentiated from other species of the robusta group from Brazil based on the characters mentioned in the following key.
1 Gould (1931); 2 Polhemus (1997); 3 Heckman (1998); 4 Pereira & Melo (2007); 5 Moreira & Ribeiro (2009); 6 Moreira et al. (2010); 7Moreira & Barbosa (2011); 8this study; 9 Moreira et al. (2011a); 10 Cunha et al. (2015); 11 Floriano & Moreira (2015); 12 Drake & Harris (1935); 13 Nieser & Melo (1997); 14 Souza et al. (2006); 15 Moreira & Campos (2012); 16Moreira & Barbosa (2012); 17 Taylor & Ferreira (2012); 18 Dias-Silva et al. (2013); 19 Castanhole et al. (2013); 20Moreira et al. (2012); 21 White (1879); 22 Bacon (1948); 23 Polhemus & Polhemus (1985); 24 Cordeiro & Moreira (2015); 25 Moreira & Barbosa (2014).
description: Published as part of Magalhães, Oséias Martins, Moreira, Felipe Ferraz Figueiredo & Galvão, Cleber, 2016, A new species of Rhagovelia Mayr, 1865 (Hemiptera: Heteroptera: Veliidae) from Pará State, with an updated key to Brazilian species of the robusta group, pp. 586-594 in Zootaxa 4171 (3) on pages 587-590, DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.4171.3.12, http://zenodo.org/record/256803