Relictanum braziliensis Curran 1939, comb. nov.
Creators: name: Miranda, Gil Felipe Gonçalves
name: Marshall, Stephen A.
name: Skevington, Jeffrey H.
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2014
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Arthropoda
Insecta
Diptera
Syrphidae
Relictanum
Relictanum braziliensis

description: Relictanum braziliensis (Curran, 1939) comb. nov.
Map 1. Figure 43.
Baccha braziliensis Curran, 1939.— Curran, 1939: 9. Type locality: Brazil, Mato grosso. Holotype female AMNH. Hull, 1949a: 213 (fig. 101, abdomen), 283 (fig. 387, wing).
Ocyptamus braziliensis. Thompson et al., 1976: 13 (catalog citation).
Baccha martorelli Telford, 1973.— Telford, 1973: 230. Type locality: Puerto Rico, Castañer. Holotype female WSU (not examined). 231 (fig. 3, abdomen). n. syn.
Male. Head: Dark brown to black. Face narrow, almost straight dorsal to tubercle, white pilose, black around base of antennal. Lunule usually entirely black. Frontal triangle dull brown-pollinose medially but pollen sometimes absent in a narrow central region, white-silver pollen continuous from face restricted to lateral margin except around eye contiguity, white pilose; frontal prominence slightly protuberant at level of frontal triangle. Vertical triangle with only 1 median row of pile; ocellar triangle separated by its length from posterior eye margin. Eye contiguity 1.5 times as long as vertical triangle length. Eye with posterior indentation at level of antennal insertion. Antennal insertions confluent. Dorsal ¼ of occiput with dull black pollen, ventral ¾ with white-silver pollen; dorsal ¼ with 1 row of scale-like white pile; middle ½ with 2–3 rows of white scale-like pile, anterior row shorter and with lanceolate pile; ventral ¼ with 2 rows of scale-like white pile.
Thorax: Scutum black, with inconspicuous sub-median antero-postero pair of white pollinose vittae; scutum white pilose, with slightly longer pile on notopleuron and distinctly longer pile on anterior row. Scutellum black, white pilose, subscutellar fringe pile long and white. Pleuron white pilose and black. Plumula white. Calypter white. Halter white to yellow.
Wing: Entirely lightly infuscated, bare on basal 2/5 of c and basal ¼ of r; alula light infuscated, large, 3 times as broad as c cell, entirely microtrichose.
Legs: Legs dark brown to black. Profemur apex pale, protibia basal ⅓ pale. Apex of mesofemur and basal 2/5 of mesotibia pale. Apex of metafemur and basal ¼ of metatibia pale; metacoxa pile white.
Abdomen: Dark brown to black; around 3 times as long as thorax. First tergite pile white. Second tergite long, length 2.2 times minimum width, and with subapical arcuate fascia of dull black pollen with small medial basal projection; 2nd tergite mainly with erect and white pile except appressed and black dorsally and longer laterally. Third tergite trapezoidal, length ~1.26 times minimum width, and with large triangular macula of dull black pollen medially; 3rd tergite with mainly appressed and black pile but with distinct shining white pile intermixed; 3rd sternite rectangular and long. Fourth tergite sub-quadrate, and with pair of sub-median sub-shining apically; remaining characters as on 3rd. Fifth tergite rectangular and wide, and dull pollinose region divided into 3 median vittae; remaining characteristics as on 4th. Genitalia: Cercus with 1–2 regular rows of pile on medial margin and 2 irregular rows on lateral margin. Surstylus sub-quadrate, directed ventrally, with ventro-apical corner extended, with setulae (around 16) ventro-apically except for ventro-apical corner, setulae longer medially. Subepandrial sclerite deep concave anteriorly and posteriorly, homogenously sclerotized. Hypandrium sub-quadrate, ventral notch with irregular margin on anterior ½, with a few long pile (around 6) subapically on ventro-lateral margin. Phallapodeme weakly sclerotized on basal ½. Basiphallus with posterior extremity strongly curved back dorsally, distiphallus weakly sclerotized and anterior surface straight. Postgonite narrow, curved, with few pile basoventrally, ventral surface convex, dorsal surface concave; postgonite apex acute, with lateral spine on apical ⅓.
Female: Like male except: Rarely with lateral ¼ of face pale. Pile white around base of antenna. Frons narrow but widening from vertex. Vertex narrow; ocellar triangle ~1.5 times its length from posterior eye margin and ~0.5 ocelli-width from lateral eye margin. Basal ½ of r, base of r1 and baso-anterior ½ of bm might also be bare. Protibia and mesotibia sometimes with basal ½ pale. Basal ⅓ of metatibia pale. Second abdominal tergite slightly narrower, 2.7 as long as wide. Third tergite shorter and with wider apical margin, and black pollen recedes laterally on anterior corner; 3rd sternite similar to tergite. Fourth rectangular and wide. Sixth segment short, a ⅓ of the length of the 5th. Genitalia: 7th tergite rectangular, normal, with pile only on apical ½; 7th sternite rectangular but weakly sclerotized. Eighth tergite shallowly notched anteriorly and posteriorly; 8th sternite unsclerotized on median ½. Tenth tergite notched anteriorly and with a small convex projection medially on posterior margin, with narrow baso-lateral projections; 10th sternite reduced to a triangular sclerite. Cercus fused to lateral margin of 10th tergite, densely pilose and with setulae directed basally on dorsal ½.
Length. 6.5–7mm; wing ~ 5.5mm.
Distribution. Brazil (Goiás, Mato Grosso), Mexico (Jalisco), Puerto Rico.
Material examined. UNKNOWN. Rio, Ataca a Pulvinaria, Frank M. Hull Collection C.N.C. 1973, sp. nov. rel. to trilobatus also rel. to infanta [front], with silver hair like infanta but longer, no left spots on front. Dif. abd. figure from triloba [back; Hull’s handwriting on his determination label], 17 Nov 1930, Dario (1 ♂, CNC Diptera 161209, 1 ♀, CNC Diptera 161208). BRAZIL. Goiás, Jataí, Jan 1955, [M.] Carrera (1♂, MZUSP); Mato Grosso, Poxoréu, Coronel Ponce, Baccha braziliensis Curran Holotype [red label], J. Lane (1 ♀, holotype Baccha braziliensis, AMNH). MEXICO. Jalisco, Estacion de Biologia, Chamela, 1 Oct 1985, J. G. Rozen (1 ♂, AMNH). PUERTO RICO. Rio Piedras, Malaise trap, Baccha martorelli para. Telford [yellow label], 19–22 Oct 1968, H.S. Telford (1 ♀, paratype Baccha martorelli, USNM).
Comments. One male and one female, from an unknown locality, have labels indicating that they were fed on Pulvinaria sp. (Hemiptera: Coccidae).
R. braziliensis is very close to R. shropshirei. Curran set the two species apart based on the dull maculae on the 5th abdominal tergite, where “[B. braziliensis] Fifth segment with three opaque triangles that are connected or narrowly separated posteriorly, […]” which would be different from B. shropshirei “[…]the fifth with a median vitta on the basal two-thirds and an elongate oval, oblique spot extending from the base to the apical corners; […]”. On close inspection of the type specimens, they do not appear to differ in abdominal markings, but, as noted on R. shropshirei (see redescription below), they do differ in wing microtrichosity and some genitalic features.
The paratype of B. martorelli studied lacked its abdomen, but Telford (1973) indicates that the dark abdominal pollen patterns of this species are not variable. Although Telford compared his species to B. shropshirei, he did not compare it to B. braziliensis.
description: Published as part of Miranda, Gil Felipe Gonçalves, Marshall, Stephen A. & Skevington, Jeffrey H., 2014, Revision of the genus Pelecinobaccha Shannon, description of Relictanum gen. nov., and redescription of Atylobaccha flukiella (Curran, 1941) (Diptera: Syrphidae), pp. 1-154 in Zootaxa 3819 (1) on pages 88-90, DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.3819.1.1, http://zenodo.org/record/251284