Thrips leucaenae Moulton 1942, new species
Creators: name: Moulton, Dudley
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 1942
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Arthropoda
Insecta
Thysanoptera
Thripidae
Thrips
Thrips leucaenae

description: 8. Thrips <i>leucaenae</i>, new species. Female holotype: head and thorax golden brown <i>with</i> back of head lighter and sides of pterothorax darker, abdomen brown; antenna! segments 1, 2, and 4 to <i>7</i> brown with extreme bases of 4 and <i>5</i> lighter, segment 3 yellow; legs yellow with outer middle portions of middle and hind femora <i>darkened</i> with brown; wings brownish, lighter at base; <i>prominent</i> spines on body and wings brown; crescents of ocelli dark orange. <i>Head</i> clearly wider <i>than</i> long, cheeks arched, back of head cross striate; ocelli large, <i>with</i> a stout spine immediately in front of and behind each posterior ocellus; fifth antenna! segment broadly joined to six. <i>Prothorax</i> faintly cross striate and <i>rather</i> conspicuously spinose; posterior margin normally with <i>three</i> inner spines on either side. Spines of!}1etanotal plate placed immediately on the anterior margin. Spines on fore vein of forewing as follows: (<i>right</i> wing) four basal, followed by njne continuing to past middle of wing, two and one distal; (left wing) four basal, followed by six and then 1-1-1-1; hind vein <i>with</i> fifteen-sixteen. Abdominal segments 3 to <i>7</i> each with a dark <i>brown transverse</i> line near anterior margin; comb on posterior margin of segment 8 complete but weak; tenth segment with complete dorsal suture. Total body length 1.04 mm.; head length 0.13 mm., width 0.16 mm.; prothorax length 0.14 mm., width 0.20 mm.; spines on posterior angles of prothorax, outer 66, inner 82 microns; on ninth abdominal segment 106 and on <i>tenth</i> 113 microns. Antenna! segments, length (width): II, 33 (24); III, 40 (18); IV, 53 (16); V, 40 (16); VI, 50 (16); VII, 16 microns. Piti, May 1, June 22, in flowers of Leucaena <i>glauca</i> (5464) and <i>Barringtonia raceniosa</i> (5474), holotype female, five para type females, Swezey. The spines of fore veins of forewings of the <i>paratypes</i> show much <i>varia­</i> tion, one paratype having four basal followed by a second series of four and with three distal. A second paratype, on the right wing, has four basal, four - median and four widely <i>scattered</i> distal spines, while on left wing there are four basal, followed by six reaching to middle of wing and four scattered in distal half. <i>T. leucaenae</i> is most closely related to T. <i>hawaiiensis imitator Friesner</i> (<i>albipes</i> Bagnall) and might possibly be a variation of this species. However until more specimens are available for comparison, it seems advisable to hold it as a separate species. I have examined a long series of T. <i>hawaiiensis</i> from the Hawaiian islands, China and Japan and the arrangement of spines on the fore vein is consistent with the usual two groups of three or four at the base and the three, sometimes four, distal spines. The basal spines invariably encl opposite the second or <i>third</i> spine in the series on the posterior vein, never extending to or beyond the middle of the wing. The posterior angle spines of the <i>prothorax</i> also are longer in <i>leucaenae than</i> in <i>hawaiiensis</i> or its variety <i>imitator</i> <i>.</i>
description: Published as part of <i>Moulton, Dudley, 1942, Thysanoptera: Thrips of Guam, pp. 7-16 in Insects of Guam I, Bernice P. Bishop Museum Bulletin</i> on pages 9-10, DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.3634035