Xenapates atratus Koch 2007, sp. n.
Creators: name: Koch, Frank
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2007
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Arthropoda
Insecta
Hymenoptera
Psychodidae
Xenapates
Xenapates atratus

description: Xenapates atratus sp. n.   Figs 2, 11  
 Etymology: From the Latin atratus, black, referring to the black body colour.   
Description:  
 Female.   
 Head black; distal flagellomeres of antenna dirty whitish ventrally, mandible light brown with whitish basal half; clypeus whitish; labrum whitish with a light brown median spot at base. Thorax black with following white: posterior margin and lateral markings of pronotum, extreme outer lateral marking of tegula, postspiracular sclerite, two large lateral spots on mesoscutellum, mesoscutellar appendage, metascutellum, and a spot on mesopleuron. Legs white with following blackish: lateral surface at base of coxa 3, anterior and posterior surface of femur 1, apical two-thirds of anterior and posterior surface of femur 2, apical third of femur 3, inner part of tibiae 1/2, inner part of apex of tibia 3, more or less all tarsi. Wings bicoloured, with apical half conspicuously infuscate and basal half hyaline; costa, subcosta, stigma and rest of venation brown. Abdomen black, terga and sterna with narrow white posterior margin.   
Head from above slightly narrowed behind eyes. Antenna 1.7× as long as maximum head width. POL:OOL=1.0:2.3–2.9 (2.7 HT). Postocellar area: width:length = 1.0:1.1– 1.3 (1.3 HT); lateral furrows slightly convex. Frontal area with obtuse anterior crossridge, medially not interrupted; lateral furrows convex, ending scrobiculate at small lateral tubercles; interantennal groove shallowly, slightly transversally curved. Vertex, frons and gena nearly impunctate, strongly shining. Base of mandible moderately punctate. Pubescence on vertex white, about as long as diameter of a lateral ocellus. Thorax nearly impunctate, strongly shining.Abdomen without microsculpture, strongly shining.  
Serrulae 9–11 as in Fig. 2.  
Length: 6.3–9.2 mm.  
 Male. Unknown.   
 Holotype: ^“ TOGO: Kloto, forest area, Oct. 2001, leg.: G. Goergen ”; [red] “ Holotypus, Xenapates atratus sp. n., det.: F. Koch ” (MNHU).   
Paratypes: 3^same data as holotype (MNHU, IITAC).  
Host plant: Unknown.  
Distribution: Togo (Fig. 1).  
 Remarks: In Koch’s (1995) key to species of Xenapates, X. atratus leads to X. braunsi and X. gabunensis (couplet 50). The distribution ranges of X. atratus and X. braunsi overlap (Fig. 1).   
 The new species, however, differs from X. braunsi in the shape of the serrulae (Figs 2, 3). In addition, the white spot of the mesoscutellum of X. atratus is divided into two large lateral spots, whereas in X. braunsi the whitish spot is located at the posterior margin of the mesoscutellum, and the basal halves of X. braunsi wings are subhyaline. The lateral tubercles of the crossridge of X. braunsi are also more distinctly developed than in X. atratus.   
 The differentiation from X. gabunensis is based only on the shape of the serrulae (Fig. 4). The females of X. gabunensis (males are also unknown) may be distinguished by the dirty whitish tegulae and the whitish spot on the mesoscutellum, which is conspicuously smaller and located at the posterior margin of the mesoscutellum.   
 The variability of X. atratus is apparent in the outline of the white spot of the mesoscutellum, which may be indistinctly separated into two lateral spots. Sometimes a brownish median line on the mesoscutellar appendage is visible.
description: Published as part of Koch, Frank, 2007, Three new species and three new records of Xenapates from Togo (Hymenoptera: Symphyta: Tenthredinidae), pp. 111-120 in African Invertebrates 48 (2) on pages 113-114, DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.7667905