Abantiades malleus Moore and Beaver 2022, sp. nov.
Creators: name: Moore, Michael D.
name: Beaver, Ethan P.
name: Bradford, Tessa
name: Hutchinson, Paul M.
name: Kay, Paul
name: Temby, Nick
name: Hamon, Howard
name: Stevens, Mark I.
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2022
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Arthropoda
Insecta
Lepidoptera
Hepialidae
Abantiades
Abantiades malleus

description: Abantiades malleus Moore and Beaver sp. nov.
Figs 2, 3, 4, 5
Material Examined: Holotype ♂. (Fig. 2a). In ANIC: 32°53’56.4”S 121°11’01.0”E, AUSTRALIA WA, Peak Charles NP. 16 APR 2007., MV-lamp & UV-lt., A. Zwick & G. Cocking. / Spec. No., 20005, leg removed, for tissue storage, M.D. Moore. / Dissection ID EPB-ANIC-026.
Paratypes. 2♂, in ANIC: Same data as holotype except with: Spec. Nos., ‘21002’ and ‘21012 ’.
2♀, in ANIC: Both with same data as holotype except one (Fig. 2b) with: Spec. No., 21013 [Genbank accession: OM 541928], leg removed, for tissue storage, M.D. Moore. The other specimen with: Spec. No., 21014 [Genbank accession: OM 541927], leg removed, for tissue storage, M.D. Moore. / Dissection M.D. Moore 9 th June 2021.
Diagnosis: The winged, hammerhead shape of the antennal rami (Fig. 5b) of the male are sufficient to distinguish this species from other Abantiades, while in the female the lanceolate shaped (Fig. 5d), acuminate pointed rami are also distinct within the genus.
In all currently described Abantiades species each has uniquely shaped pieces that make up its genitalia (see Fig. 3a–d) and a uniquely shaped Sternite VIII on the abdomen and this species follows that trend. The mtDNA COI corroborates the morphological distinction from all other Abantiades species, and as a diagnostic tool can be used to identify this species (see Fig. 1). For comparison with similar or co-habiting species see the Remarks section below.
Description.
Male.
Head: Compound eyes each approximately size of head capsule. Labial palps: three segmented, second palpomere longest, near midpoint curved laterally, distal end slightly swollen, third palpomere shortest, globular, all covered in elongate blunt ended scales, black/dark brown at apex, rest red-brown. Antennae dark red-brown, one third length of costa, 74 segments; Flagellum continuously tapered to apex, monopectinate, rami emerging ventrally and changing shape along flagellum. Basal rami short, rounded, graduating to spade shape, then to short, wide, hammerhead shape, 4 to 5 times flagellum width (Fig. 5a, b). Central part ramus paler, with dark red anterior/ posterior, apically convex, wing-like projections. Proximal faces curved, and covered in thin colourless setae, margins rounded, densely covered in long colourless setae. Distal faces flat, with only few colourless setae. Frons and fronto-clypeus clothed in dark, red-brown scales.
Thorax: Dorsally, clothed in densely packed, dark red-brown piliform scales. Forewing length 39-45 mm, wing membrane clear, veins light red-brown, edged with red-brown scales. Dorsal surface: Costa clothed in small tightly packed, lanceolate red-brown scales. Area between costa and Sc vein, darker at wing base, lighter towards apex, filled with tightly packed grey spathulate shaped scales majority darker towards scale base. Between Sc and Rs4 a greyish hue, covered in thick lines of grey scales and thin dark brown lines producing a scrolling pattern, and other brown marks highlighted by light grey. Between Rs4 and M3, central area filled with brown, red-brown and chestnut scales, with, an occasional chestnut or light brown line and little scrolling. Two large prominent white lines: submarginal from M3 to just anterior of Rs2, white, edged with thick band of medium brown scales itself edged with a thin chestnut line; discoidal line similar but less highlighted and usually divided into a basal and distal portion. Anterior to this line two eyespots edged in grey and/or golden coloured scales; proximal, near wing base, dark, obvious; distal paler and less distinct. Along termen, and posterior to two white marks, prominent fine to medium thick, light grey, scrolling lines, edged thinly in brown scales, giving posterior part of wing a light grey hue. Ventral surface; dorsal white markings easily visible. Towards termen and apex, wing thinly covered in medium brown lanceolate scales. Scale coverage basally sparser with paler piliform scales. Hindwing length 26–34 mm. Dorsal surface: veins and membrane as forewing, thinly covered in long straw/brown piliform scales, lighter and longer in base. Ventral surface: as for ventral forewing. Legs; Fore and mid legs covered in brown scales, hind legs lighter. Arolium present, fore and mid legs somewhat cloven in shape, hindlegs triangular. Epiphysis not examined.
Abdomen: Clothed in long, piliform scales. Dorsally, tergites I and II brown, remainder yellowish brown. Ventrally pale red-brown. Sternite VIII (Fig. 3d): posterior margin almost straight, shallow convex medially with stronger sclerotisation. Posterior corners almost right angled; lateral margins slightly angled medially for 60% of length, more strongly angled anteriorly, anterior corner forming a shallow curve towards anterior margin. Anterior margin complex, bilateral, three joined gentle concavities. On ventral surface, four slightly curved, transverse ridges medially, posterior ridge contiguous with posterior margin.
Genitalia: (Fig. 3a–c). Vincular arm length approximately 2.8 mm (relatively short) broadly lenticular, distal portions curving medially. Saccus “V” shaped with anterior margin short and blunt; posterior margin of ventral face has concave ends with a shallow, but prominent medial sclerotised acuminate point; posterior margin of dorsal face deeply concave. When genitalia in closed position twin tergal processes almost in horizontal plane about 0.5 mm long, cylindrical with rounded apices. Trulleum substantially sclerotised, unusually long, “Y” shaped, 1.3 mm long by 0.5 mm wide, with thick substantial “arms.” Juxta prominent and substantial, posterior lateral lobes on stem of a “T” shaped base. Pseudoteguminal lobes wider at base than high, basal rim rounded and set to rear. Dorsoposterior margin gently and continually concave about half height of lobe. Dorso-posterior corner rounded convex. Disto-posterior margin broadly convex, but with a prominent round topped triangular projection half way. Distoposterior process a larger, rounded triangular projection. Ventro-posterior margin generally concave with a small triangular projection adjacent to disto-posterior process. Ventro-pseudoteguminal arms project anteriorly, curved distally with rounded apices. Dorso-ventral margin very slightly concave. This part of pseudotegumenal lobe with deep curvaceous sculpturing set back from the margin, sinuous in outline, giving inverted image presented in Fig. 3a a look of a “dragon’s” head. Valvae: sacculus broad and rounded, 1.2 mm at maximum width. Harpes set towards rear of sacculus so that sacculus projects well forward when valva everted, producing a broad convex corner. Harpes relatively short (0.6 mm) and wide (0.6 mm).
Variation: Shape of the rami is consistent but the colouring is not. In one, central ramus region white; in another pale red-brown, in third pale area present but small and circular, restricted to base of ramus. In two the discoidal white mark was bisected by a large dark brown spot, in third, not bisected. Also, the number, position, colouring and shape of the eyespots anterior to this line varied in uniformity of shape, colour and positioning. However, the basal eyespot in the fork of the SC/R and M veins was present in all three.
Female.
Head: Compound eyes large each approximately size of head capsule. Labial palps three segmented; second palpomere slightly longer than first, third palpomere shortest, globular. All covered with elongate, square ended scales; segments one and two, dorsally and ventrally yellowish with wide dark grey brown lateral margin, inner margin pale light grey, third segment covered in buff-yellow scales. Antennae (Fig. 5c, d) dark brown, one quarter length of costa, 54 segments; flagellum continuously tapering to apex; monopectinate. Rami emerge ventrally and change shape along the flagellum; basal 11 rami relatively short, rounded, lobular, rami graduating first to circular plate on stem, then broad, lanceolate with acuminate tip. Rami largest about two-fifths from antenna base, then smaller and more lanceolate. Thick, white coloured setae present on all rami, but densest around the perimeter. On proximal and distal faces, setae sparser and shorter. Frons and fronto-clypeus clothed in long, thin grey or brown/ grey scales with flat apical edge.
Thorax: Dorsally, densely clothed in grey-brown piliform scales. Forewing length 62–78 mm, wing membrane partially transparent, whitish silver in colour, veins basally coloured straw, then colourless. Dorsal surface: Costa clothed in tightly packed, buff-grey lanceolate scales. Area between costa and Sc tightly packed with grey, elongaterectangular scales. Central wing area brown, otherwise ground colour grey with irregular, curvaceous dark brown lines forming a scrolled pattern. Two large, dull white bands; longer submarginal band oblique, from apex region to CuA1, irregular lateral edges, bordered with dark brown scales; shorter discoidal band irregular shape, bisected by “eye” spot of dark brown and gold. Anterior to discoidal band, a circular, dark brown and gold, eye spot in fork of Sc/R and M veins, and a hemispherical eye spot distally. Narrow, light grey sub tornal band present. Wing base and dorsum sparsely covered with buff-yellow piliform scales. Ventral surface: Costa densely covered in buff-yellow lanceolate scales; distal half moderately covered by light brown lanceolate scales; proximal half sparsely covered by light brown piliform scales that are longest and denser basally. Hindwing length 50–58 mm, veins buff; dorsal surface, plain, light brown, distal portion moderately clothed in thin filiform scales, basal third sparsely clothed by buff-yellow scales. Ventrally, as forewing except for costa clothed in buff-yellow filiform scales. Legs; Densely covered in greyish scales, longer laterally. Inner margin grey-white, laterally silver. Arolium tear shaped.
Abdomen: Clothed in long piliform scales, anterior buff-yellow, posterior dark grey-brown.
Genitalia: (Fig. 4a–c). Internal genitalia: corpus bursae subrectangular ovoid for two thirds of length and one third forming a narrower proximal “neck” with short diverticulum at junction with ductus bursae, latter, subequal length to corpus bursae. External genitalia; dorsal plate bilobed, each approximately triangular with rounded apex. Margin of medial invagination straight, lateral margins smooth, rounded. Subanal plate sclerotized, extending medially to a narrow point. Antevaginal lamella three lobed; lateral lobes externally shaped as a parallelogram, dorsal edge flat, medially terminating in a rounded setose papilla on inner corner (red arrow, Fig. 4c). Medial lobe, two natured; a dominant, heavily sclerotized and densely setose cone-shaped central region and two disto-lateral, mildly sclerotised and partly membranous triangular processes (blue arrow, Fig. 4b).
Variation: One of the two female specimens has a grey base colour to forewing, the other pale brown. The “grey” specimen is paler to the eye, has much more obvious scrolling patterns on forewings, and many grey scales in or as part of the “white” discoidal and submarginal lines.
Distribution and biology: Recorded Locality: Peak Charles, 95 km SW of Norseman WA (Figs 13, 14).
Flight period: All collected on a single night in mid-April.
On the night of collection, no rain was recorded at Peak Charles, though at Norseman, 95 kms to the northeast 3 mm of rain was recorded. The night temperature was warm but the weather cooled considerably on the following day, due to the passage of a cold front through the area.
Larval biology: Unknown.
Habitat: Peak Charles is a granitic tor (an isolated mass of rock) with the highest elevation at 650 m. Around the base of the rock the vegetation is dominated by Allocasuarina and Acacia, with eucalypt woodland further out (Fig. 14). The GPS data provided on the specimen labels corresponds to approximately 265 m elevation. Further survey is required to determine if this species is endemic to the Peak Charles vicinity or more widespread in the Goldfields region.
Etymology: From the Latin, “malleus” or hammer, in reference to the shape of the rami on the antennae of the male.
Remarks: Looking at Fig. 1, Abantiades albofasciatus, A. furva, A. marcidus and A. malleus sp. nov. are located within a single clade, indicating their sequence similarity (see Table S1). This association is also supported by morphological similarities in the structures of the male and female genitalia.
Abantiades albofasciatus, A. furva and A. malleus sp. nov. all have unusually long projecting pseudoteguminal arms, a long but low pseudoteguminal lobe with a projecting distal lobe, which in the opinion of the authors when inverted looks like a “dragon’s head.” The similarity between A. malleus sp. nov. and A. furva goes further to include similar shaped valvae and sternite VIII, and rami that are expanded “wing like” laterally. In the females of A. albofasciatus and A. malleus sp. nov. the shapes of the dorsal plate, the antevaginal lamella and the subanal plates are also similar (see Simonsen 2018).
Abantiades albofasciatus, A. furva and A. malleus sp. nov. are only currently known from WA but all of the species in the clade have been collected in the Coolgardie bioregion raising interesting evolutionary and biogeographic questions with regards to the origins of the group. It should be noted that A. marcidus, the fourth species in the clade, is only currently known from one location in WA, Booanya (collected 1934) with the majority of its range in southern and eastern Australia.
description: Published as part of Moore, Michael D., Beaver, Ethan P., Bradford, Tessa, Hutchinson, Paul M., Kay, Paul, Temby, Nick, Hamon, Howard & Stevens, Mark I., 2022, Two new species of WesternAustralian Abantiades Herrich-Schäffer (Lepidoptera Hepialidae) and a description of the female of Abantiades paradoxa (Tindale), pp. 201-225 in Zootaxa 5133 (2) on pages 209-213, DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.5133.2.3, http://zenodo.org/record/6521664