Acanthoscelides bellamyi Romero, new species
Creators: name: Romero-Nápoles, Jesús
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2014
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Arthropoda
Insecta
Coleoptera
Chrysomelidae
Acanthoscelides
Acanthoscelides bellamyi

description: Acanthoscelides bellamyi Romero, new species  (Figs. 1–3)   
 Type Series. Holotype male, allotype female, and 25 paratypes: 16 km W Milpillas, Municipio de Ometepec, Guerrero, MEXICO, 9/XII/1983, O. J. Blanchard collector (#1542), reared seed Pavonia chlorantha (Kunth) Fryxell. Holotype, allotype, and two paratypes at the Florida State Collection of Arthropods (FSCA), paratypes at Colección Entomológica del Instituto de Fitosanidad (CEAM, 5♂, 10♀), Colección Nacional de Insectos, Instituto de Biología, UNAM (CNIN, 1♂, 3♀), and US National Museum of Natural History (USNM, 1♂, 3♀).   
 Description. Male (Fig. 1). Length (pronotumelytra) 2.19–2.70 mm, width 1.17–1.80 mm. Maximum thoracic depth 1.2–1.5 mm. Color: Brown, antennomeres 5–10 dark brown, 1–4 and 11 orange brown; base and lateral portion of elytra forming a triangular orange-brown spot on disc; head with dark brown spot starting on vertex and ending on clypeus; maxillary palpi dark brown; pro-, meso-, and metasterna brown; some specimens may present abdominal segments totally or partially dark brown and antennomere 11 may be partially dark brown. Vestiture: Body with recumbent white and golden yellow pubescence forming a light variegated pattern, except elytra that have some dark brown patches giving a more contrasting variegated pattern; undersurfaces with dense golden yellow setae; legs with moderately dense, golden setae; pygidium with moderately dense to dense golden yellow setae, with a median light stripe of dense, whitish setae. Head: Short and broad, densely micropunctulate, frons with weak impunctate median carina, distance between eyes 1.07–1.24X as wide as eye width, eye cleft 0.53–0.75X its length by ocular sinus, posterior margin of eye protruding from adjacent surfaces, postocular lobe rounded; distance from base of antennae to apex of labrum 0.45–0.50X as long as distance from upper limits of eyes to apex of labrum; antennomeres 1–3 filiform, 5–10 as wide as or wider than long, 11 acute apically (Fig. 1c); antenna extending slightly beyond humerus. Prothorax: Disk campanulate, densely foveolate; cervical sulcus shallow, extending from near coxal cavity to about 0.4–0.6 distance to pronotal midline; lateral prothoracic carina extending from base to 0.5–0.6 distance to coxal cavity; without short median impressed line on median basal lobe; prosternum separating procoxae for 0.74–0.79X their length. Meso- and metathorax: Scutellum dark brown, quadrate, bifurcate at apex, clothed with white setae; each elytron about twice as long as broad; striae moderately deep and punctate, strial intervals finely punctulate; striae 2–6 equidistant at base, with small denticles at base of striae 4–6; humerus punctulate, glabrous, shiny black; undersurfaces and all of hind coxa punctulate. Legs: First and second protarsomeres subequal; first mesotarsomere about 2X as long as second, first metatarsomere about 3X as long as second; hind femur constricted basally and apically, expanded medially to about width of coxa; femur armed with subapical acuminate spine about 1.13–1.33X as long as width of tibial base and 2 acuminate spines about 0.21–0.40X as long as first spine; hind tibia with ventral, lateroventral, lateral, and dorsomesal glabrous longitudinal carinae, but lateroventral only 0.66X as long as hind tibia; tibial corona with 4 spinules, mucro 0.30–0.33X as long as first tarsomere; without sinus at base of spine; first hind tarsomere with ventrolateral glabrous longitudinal carina. Abdomen: First sternum not flattened medially, posterior margin straight, longer than remaining sterna; sterna 2–4 similar in size; fifth deeply emarginate at apex; pygidium punctate, foveolate, convex in lateral view. Genitalia: Median lobe moderate in length; in ventral view, ventral valve gently rounded to slightly emarginated apex; lateral margins slightly concave; armature of internal sac with median wishbone-shaped, serrated sclerite, with a pair of curved spines, 2 linear spines, and 2 pairs of smaller spines, basally with paired setose sclerites (Fig. 3a). Lateral lobes slightly expanded at apex, cleft about 0.7X their length (Fig. 3b). Female (Fig. 2): Length (pronotum– elytra) 1.77–2.70 mm, width 1.14–1.80 mm. Maximum thoracic depth 0.96–1.41 mm. Similar to male, except distance between eyes 1.14–1.28X as wide as eye width, and fifth abdominal sternum not emarginate at apex.   
 Host Plant. Pavonia chlorantha (Kunth) Fryxell: 16 km W Milpillas, Municipio de Ometepec, Guerrero, Mexico, 9/XII/1983, O. J. Blanchard collector (#1542).   
 Distribution. Mexico (Guerrero).   
 Etymology. The specific epithet honors Charles L. Bellamy, who recently passed away and was one of the best specialists of Buprestidae of the world.   
 Discussion. Acanthoscelides bellamyi belongs to the A. blanchardi species-group because the metafemoral mucro is 0.3 times as long as the first tarsomere, the elytra are variegated, and the male genitalia have a rounded ventral valve and are similar to other species in the group. In the A. blanchardi species-group, A. bellamyi is very near Acanthoscelides wicki Johnson because of similarity in the integument coloration and armature of the internal sac of the male genitalia; however, they can be separated by a pair of spiny, crescent-shaped apical sclerites present in A. wicki but absent in A. bellamyi and dissimilar wishboneshaped sclerites.
description: Published as part of Romero-Nápoles, Jesús, 2014, Seed Beetles (Coleoptera: Bruchidae) Associated with Seeds ofPavoniaCav. (Malvaceae), with Description of a New Species and Notes on Three Others, pp. 61-68 in The Coleopterists Bulletin 68 (1) on pages 61-63, DOI: 10.1649/0010-065x-68.1.61, http://zenodo.org/record/10101591