Antargidium apicale Kirby
Creators: name: Schmidt, Stefan
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2012
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Arthropoda
Insecta
Hymenoptera
Argidae
Antargidium
Antargidium apicale

description: Antargidium apicale (Kirby)
(Figs 13, 16, 17)
Hylotoma apicale Kirby, 1894: 45.
Antargidium apicale: Turner 1900: 517, 518 (collection record, habitat); Morice 1919: 254 (change of combination, classification, key to genera); Benson 1934: 229 –230 (key to species); Benson 1963: 631 (classification); Taeger et al. 2010: 121 (catalogue).
Description. Female. Note. The following description is based on Benson (1934) and a damaged specimen of which only the hind part of the thorax, middle and hind legs, partial right forewing, hind wings, and abdomen including the saw (except its apex) were available for study.
Length about 5–6 mm. Abdomen orange with black apex. Pronotum black. Middle and hind legs brown. Wings slightly infuscate; veins and stigma dark brown. Sawsheath rounded at apex with distinct dorsal projections (Benson 1934, Fig. 6 a, b). Lancet with very shallow serrulae but distinct serration, proximal margins of annuli with short but distinct ctenidia.
Male. Length 5.0 mm. Upper parts of head black, gena, interantennal area and outer orbits yellow-brown. Thorax black. Legs black except forefemur at apex and foretibia yellow-brown. Abdomen orange-brown, first tergite suffused with brown and apex of abdomen from tergite four with black patch. Wings slightly infuscate; veins and stigma dark brown.
POL slightly shorter than OOL (0.8); postocellar area about 2 × as broad as long. Eye about 1.3 × as long as broad, converging below, interocular distance 1.2 × eye height.
Host. Alectryon oleifolius (Desf.) S.T.Reynolds (Sapindaceae).
Distribution. Australia: Queensland.
Types. Syntype: Male, labelled “ Type ” [round label with red margin], “B. M. TYPE HYM. 1.108”, “ apicale Kb. Type ”, “B. M. TYPE HYM., Hylotoma apicale (Kirby 1894), 1.108”, “Mackay, Queensland, G. Turner, 1892- 16”, “662” [glued on larger label], “R[…]lg 12.93” [glued on larger label] (BMNH, examined).
Additional specimens examined. Mackay, 1892, 12.[18]93, 1894, 1.[18]99, (5 3, BMNH, 1 3, USNM); Nanango Dist., H. Hacker, Nov. 1927 (1 Ƥ, QMB).
Remarks. Kirby’s (1894) original description includes both sexes and is based on three specimens, but it is not clear from the description how many specimens of each sex he had at hand. In his revision of the genus Antargidium, Benson (1934: 228) mentions the type specimens and apparently examined some or all of them, but he does not specify the number of specimens that he had at hand and their sex. For the current revision, only a single male labelled as type was available for study. This specimen agrees with the original description and bears a round label with red margin and “ Type ” printed on it. The only female specimen of the species available for examination is a non-type. It is severely damaged and lacks a head, thorax (including forelegs), and left forewing, and is therefore insufficient for a redescription of the female gender of this species.
The position of m-cu (recurrent vein) and 2r-m (cubital vein) at the junction with M (medial vein) was used by Benson (1934) to separate A. apicale from A. dentivalve. However, Benson (1935) noted that this character exhibits intraspecific variation and is not suitable for separating the species.
description: Published as part of Schmidt, Stefan, 2012, Revision of the Australian sawfly genus Antargidium (Hymenoptera, Symphyta, Argidae) with description of two new species, pp. 47-56 in Zootaxa 3180 on pages 52-53, DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.279970