Inocellia yunnanica Liu, Aspöck, Zhang & Aspöck, 2012, sp. nov.
Creators: name: Liu, Xingyue
name: Aspöck, Horst
name: Zhang, Weiwei
name: Aspöck, Ulrike
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2012
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Arthropoda
Insecta
Raphidioptera
Inocelliidae
Inocellia
Inocellia yunnanica

description: Inocellia yunnanica sp. nov.
(Figs. 3 – 7, 12 – 24)
Diagnosis. In appearance, the species is entirely black on head and thorax, and dorsally blackish brown with transverse yellowish bands on pregenital segments of the abdomen. The male is characterized in the genitalia by the elongated gonocoxite 9 with a conspicuous unguiform stylus and a subtriangular lobe posteroventrally to stylus. The female is characterized by the tergum 8 posteroventrally with a short rounded protrusion.
Description. Male. Body length 10.0 mm; forewing length 8.2 mm, hindwing length 6.6 mm.
Head (Fig. 3) subquadrate, black throughout. Antennal sclerite (torulus) and antennae blackish brown. Mouthparts black, mandibles with distal half reddish brown.
Thorax black throughout. Legs yellow with yellowish setae. Wings (Fig. 3) hyaline, pterostigma blackish brown, veins blackish brown. Anterior branch of Rs with one forked vein and one simple vein running to wing margin.
Abdomen blackish brown with venter much paler; joints of each pregenital segment transversely yellow. Genital segments entirely yellow. Tergum 9 (Figs. 12 – 13) approximately 1.5 times as long as sternum, anterior margin feebly incised medially, posterior margin nearly truncate. Sternum 9 (Figs. 12 – 14) arcuate, with anterior margin slightly prominent. Gonocoxite 9 (Figs. 12 – 16) broadly dome-like, much longer than width of its proximal portion, with apex acutely pointed in lateral view; stylus (gonostylus 9) produced from medial portion of inner side, unguiform and feebly curved ventrad; a rounded lobe posteroventral to the stylus; a bristle tuft anterior to stylus. Pseudostylus (basal part of gonapophysis 9) (Figs. 14 – 15) paired, feebly sclerotized, narrowly foliate. Fused parameres (complex of fused gonocoxites, gonapophyses, gonostyli 10) (Figs. 16, 18) flattened and subtrapezoidal on proximal portion, ventrally bearing a slender distal projection, which is slightly curved dorsad. Gonarcus (fused gonocoxites 11) (Figs. 15 – 17) shield-like, nearly trapezoidal in caudal view, medially prominent posteriad. Endophallus (Figs. 14 – 16) short, dorsally with a pair of short bristle tufts on proximal portion and a pair of long bristle tufts on feebly sclerotized areas of distal portion, ventrally with a short bristle tuft medially. A scabrous membranous structure is present near the proximodorsal portion of endophallus. Ectoproct (Fig. 12) in lateral view subquadrate. Hypandrium internum (Fig. 19) small with lateral lobes foliate and slightly sinuate posteriorly.
Female. Forewing length 13.3 mm, hindwing length 11.5 mm.
Sternum 7 (Figs. 20 – 21, 24) nearly trapezoidal in lateral view, posterior margin slightly produced. Tergum 8 (Figs. 20, 22, 24) posteroventrally with a short and round protrusion. Subgenital plate (fused gonocoxites 8) (Figs. 20 – 21, 24) separated into a broadly subquadrate sclerite anteriorly and a small ovoid sclerite posteriorly, which are connected by a grooved membrane. Atrium bursae (Figs. 20, 23) subtriangular, slightly sclerotized ventrad; sacculus bursae and receptaculum seminis damaged in female paratype, but well preserved in the female specimen from Mt. Meili (Fig. 23).
Type material. Holotype 3, “ CHINA / Yunnan, Puer city, Jingdong county, Wuliangshan Nature Reserve, Gibbon Observation Station [1787 m], N 24°21ʹ0 7ʺ/E 100°42ʹ12ʺ, April, 2.2010, ZHANG Weiwei leg.” (CAU). Paratype 1♀, same data as holotype (CAU).
Other material. 1♀, CHINA: “YUNNAN, 5.-8.vii.1996, 28°06ʹN 98°54ʹE, 2700 m, Hengduan mts-part MEILI, Vít Kubáň leg.” (HUAC); 1♀, CHINA: Yunnan, Tengchong, Datang [25°33ʹN, 98°53ʹE, 1118 m] (CAU).
Distribution. The new species is found to be distributed in three mountain ranges, i.e. Wuliangshan Range in central Yunnan, Gaoligongshan Range in western Yunnan, and Meili in northwestern Yunnan, all of which belong to the Hengduan orographic uplift.
Etymology. The specific epithet ‘yunnanica’ refers to the endemic distribution in Yunnan Province. It is an adjective in the feminine nominative case from Latin Yunnanicus, -a, -um = Yunnanian.
Remarks. The new species belongs to the Inocellia fulvostigmata group and appears to be closely related to Inocellia longispina from Thailand by having similar male gonocoxite 9 with a conspicuous stylus and a subtriangular lobe. However, the new species differs from I. longispina by the elongated male gonocoxite 9, the unguiform stylus, and the endophallus with five tufts, while in I. longispina the male gonocoxite 9 is much shorter with digitiform stylus and the endophallus possesses only one pair of tufts on the dorsal surface. The female of the new species can be easily distinguished from the other Inocellia species by the tergum 8 with a posteroventral protrusion. Since we did not find male specimens of the new species from the Gaoligongshan and Meili ranges, the current identification of the two female specimens from these two localities was made tentatively; these specimens are not placed in the type series.
The following biological notes pertain to the type specimens. These specimens were collected from a naturally dead tree (species unidentified) at the top of a mountain, where some large trees were cut down, leaving a relatively open area. The male was collected as a pupa sitting in a small hole when removing the tree bark in the afternoon (ca. 4:00 pm). The female was collected as a freshly emerged adult on the bark of the same tree in the evening (ca. 9:00 pm).
Discussion
Until a few years ago it was assumed that the east of Asia (where the southern boundary of the occurrence of Raphidioptera lies) harbors only one or two species of snakeflies (H. Aspöck et al. 1991). In recent years this view has been entirely changed. Surprisingly, several new species belonging to the family Inocelliidae had been discovered in the south of China and in the north of Thailand, respectively (Liu et al. 2010a, b; U. Aspöck et al. 2011).
Altogether nine species of Raphidioptera, all belonging to the family Inocelliidae, can be attributed to the Yunnanian centre:
Inocellia digitiformis Liu, H. Aspöck, Yang & U. Aspöck, 2010 (China: Sichuan) Inocellia nigra sp. nov. (China: Yunnan)
Inocellia cheni Liu, H. Aspöck, Yang & U. Aspöck, 2010 (China: Guanxi, Yunnan) Inocellia longispina U. Aspöck, Liu, Rausch & H. Aspöck, 2011 (NW-Thailand) Inocellia bilobata U. Aspöck, Liu, Rausch & H. Aspöck, 2011 (NW-Thailand) Inocellia striata U. Aspöck, Liu, Rausch & H. Aspöck, 2011 (NW-Thailand) Inocellia cornuta U. Aspöck, Liu, Rausch & H. Aspöck, 2011 (NW-Thailand) Inocellia yunnanica sp. nov. (China: Yunnan)
Parainocellia burmana (U. Aspöck & H. Aspöck, 1968) (Myanmar)
As can be seen from the list, three species have been recorded within Yunnan, one species has been found in the adjacent Province of Sichuan, one species has been described from Myanmar, and four species are known from the northwest of Thailand. There is no other part in the world where such a high number of species occurs in a territory of comparable size. In most parts of the Old World only one species of Inocelliidae occurs (H. Aspöck et al. 2012). One may certainly question whether all these nine species are to be assigned to one single refugial centre, namely the Yunnanian centre in the sense of de Lattin (1967) or whether several centres or subcentres within this part of Southeast Asia can be located. There can be no doubt that Thailand lies within the Oriental realm; however, the mountainous regions in the north together with the higher altitudes of Yunnan and Myanmar may be classified as representing a transgression zone between the Palaearctic and the Oriental regions, whereby the percentage of the Oriental elements is apparently the prevailing one.
As we have already discussed elsewhere (U. Aspöck et al. 2011), one cannot exclude the possibility that the I. fulvostigmata group of the genus Inocellia has an Oriental origin. Of the three species so far found in Yunnan, one (I. nigra) belongs to the I. crassicornis group (which is certainly of Palaearctic origin), but two (I. cheni, I. yunnanica) belong to the I. fulvostigmata group.
Currently, only eight specimens (four males, four females) of Inocelliidae from altogether six localities in Yunnan are known from collections. The fact that they represent three species leads to the assumption that this part of China, which has several hotspots of biodiversity (Yang et al. 2004), may harbor further species.
It is of interest that no specimens of the second family of Raphidioptera, Raphidiidae, have been found in Yunnan, as yet. The nearest records of Raphidiidae are from the Hubei Province. It seems inconceivable that the family Raphidiidae does not occur in Yunnan. Further investigations on snakeflies in Yunnan might lead to additional discoveries.
Acknowledgements
We are much indebted to Mr. Liang Ding (Beijing) and Mr. Hao Huang (Shanghai), as well as to Mr. Víteslav Kubáň (Brno) for kindly providing the valuable specimens which were collected in Yunnan. Grateful thanks go to Prof. Dr. Peter Comes (Salzburg) and to Prof. Dr. Thomas Schmitt (Trier) for valuable discussions on biogeography. We thank Dr. John Plant (Vienna) for linguistic improvement. The research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 31000973 and 31110103002) and the Foundation for the Author of National Excellent Doctoral Dissertation of PR China (No. 201178).
References
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description: Published as part of Liu, Xingyue, Aspöck, Horst, Zhang, Weiwei & Aspöck, Ulrike, 2012, New species of the snakefly genus Inocellia Schneider, 1843 (Raphidioptera: Inocelliidae) from Yunnan, China, pp. 43-52 in Zootaxa 3298 on pages 46-52, DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.211415