Stenoheriades bifida ♂ Griswold 2018, n. sp.
Creators: name: Griswold, Terry
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2018
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Arthropoda
Insecta
Hymenoptera
Megachilidae
Stenoheriades
Stenoheriades bifida

description: StenoheRiades bifida n. sp. (Figs 1–9)
Diagnosis. Unique among Stenoheriades in the long, twin spines of T7 (Fig. 7), the large polished plate of S2, with its subtruncate and rather serrate apical margin (Figs 8, 9), and the very high, serrated posterior portion of the hypostomal carina (Fig. 3).
Description. Male: Length, 8 mm; forewing, 6 mm. Black except tegula, distal tarsi dark brown. Wings well stained apically and in marginal cell, venation black. Pubescence white, long, dense, erect, on lower face to above level of antennal socket, gena ventrally, scutellum, propodeum along juncture of lateral and posterior faces, mesepisternum ventrally, posterior margins of fore and mid basitarsi, S2 apicolaterally; T1–T6 with complete narrow apical fasciae of apically directed pubescence, that on T1 broadened laterally; Punctation fine, contiguous or nearly so on frons and scutum; coarser, distinctly separated on mesepisternum; fine on terga, well separated on T1–T3, becoming denser, slightly coarser on T4–T6; propodeum with posterior face impunctate medially; S2 impunctate except apicolaterally.
Head length approximately equal to width, eyes converging ventrally (Fig. 2); preoccipital carina absent; ocelli not reduced; interocellar distance slightly greater than ocellocular distance, slightly less than ocelloccipital distance; interantennal area without juxtantennal carina; clypeus with apical margin truncate, denticulate; mandible narrow, bidentate, with prominent pointed ventral tooth and truncate dorsal tooth; labrum with basal rounded ridge, apical margin slightly rounded, not thickened; hypostomal carina not raised on anterior limb and rounded angle, very high, serrate posteriorly (Fig. 3); mouthparts elongate (Fig. 4), exceeding fossa in repose; pronotal lobe carinate; scutum posterolateral corner rounded, not acutely angled; scutellum nearly flat, shelf-like, not overhanging metanotum; axilla rounded, not projecting; metanotum vertical; propodeum without distinct dorsal shelf, nearly vertical medially, with basal row of pits contiguous laterally, smaller, separated medially, without carina separating dorsal and posterior areas; mesepisternum lacking omaulus; episternal scrobe indistinct, no larger than surrounding punctures; metapleuron lacking dorsal projection, with shallow horizontal grooves; hind femur without ventral carina; T1 with distinct, curved carina separating anterior and dorsal faces (Fig. 6); T6 with preapical transverse carina spinose medially (Fig. 7), apical margin strongly concave in posterior view, with short spine laterally; T7 bispinose, spines long, widely separated (Fig. 7); S1 with triangular, slightly concave face posteriorly, apical margin simple, shallowly concave (Fig. 8); S2 very large, largely covering S3, S4 (Fig. 8), its apical margin subtruncate, irregular, with small, bidentate medial projection (Fig. 9); S3 with wide apicomedial fringe of long, pubescence curved medially; S4 notched medially; S5 with distinct rounded lateral angle surmounted by small, rounded carina; apical margin spiculate, strongly expanded apically into narrowly rounded lobe.
Female: Unknown.
Type material. Holotype: ♂, “ INDIA, Goa Molem [Mollem]”// “ No. 95 18 II 1980 leg. Topál”//”HOLOTYPE Stenoheriades bifida ♂ Griswold HOLO85”. Paratype: ♂, identical label data (BBSL1056948). Holotype deposited in HNHM; paratype in BBSL.
Distribution. Tropical India. Known from a single locality in the state of Goa, Mollem (15.376° 74.227°), in the Northwestern Ghats montane rain forests ecoregion.
Comments. Stenoheriades bifida does not fit in any of the four species groups previously identified by Griswold (1985). It shares with the S. prionota Griswold and S. livingstonei (Cockerell) species groups the absence of preoccipital carinae, absence of juxtantennal carinae, absence of omaular carinae, and the presence of a crenulate carina on T6. It differs from these two species groups in the presence of horizontal grooves dorsally on the metepisternum, the serate hypostomal carina, the bispinose T7, and the polished, concave, and apically projected S2.
Etymology. The specific epithet is taken from the Latin ‘bifida’, a feminine adjective in the nominative singular, in reference to the distinctive elongate twin spines of T7.
description: Published as part of Griswold, Terry, 2018, First record of Stenoheriades Cockerell in tropical Asia: Stenoheriades bifida, new species (Hymenoptera: Megachilidae), pp. 279-282 in Zootaxa 4370 (3) on pages 280-282, DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.4370.3.7, http://zenodo.org/record/1145553