Tohila Hubbell 1938
Creators: name: Cadena-Castañeda, Oscar J.
name: Soto, Wolfang Andrés Rodríguez
name: Cárdenas, Andrea Del Pilar Floréz
name: Acevedo, Angélica
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2021
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Arthropoda
Insecta
Orthoptera
Haglotettigoniidae
Tohila

description: Tohila Hubbell, 1938
http://lsid.speciesfile.org/urn:lsid: Orthoptera.speciesfile.org:TaxonName:30553
Diagnosis. Eyes not reduced (as long as scapus) and normally pigmented (Fig. 1A). Anterior margin of pronotum with conspicuous setae; lateral lobes of pronotum not expanded laterally and without carinae dividing the pronotal disc and the lateral lobes. Male tegmina thickened, covering about half of the abdomen and without stridulation file, veins longitudinally distributed, hind wings as small rudiments (Fig. 1). Female tegmina ovoid, not touching dorsally, being as lateral pads and extended to metanotum. Legs relatively short and stout, hind tibia with two dorsal spurs on each margin; all tarsi slender and very elongated, first tarsomere unarmed dorsally and as long as half of its respective tibiae (Fig. 2). Abdominal tergites unspecialized; male epiproctus subtriangular, wider than long, with straight margins and rounded apex. Cerci very slender and extremely elongated longer than the body (Fig. 1B). Ovipositor nearly straight, four-fifths as long as the hind femur, apex slender and briefly lanceolate (Fig. 2). Male genitalia: compact, ectophallic fold membranous and poorly developed; pseudepiphallic median lophi with a wide medial notch; pseudepiphallic paramere rounded, undivided and with several hairs at apex; endophallic apodeme moderately sclerotized, with cartilaginous appearance and connected to endophallic sclerite which is well sclerotized; ectophallic apodeme slim, curved in lateral view and with braches divergent.
Taxa included. Tohila atelomma Hubbell, 1938.
Comments. Hubbell (1938) originally included Tohila, in the subfamily Pentacentrinae, and moved Lissotrachelus Brunner von Wattenwyl, 1893 and Trigonidomimus Caudell, 1912 to the same subfamily. The three genera were placed within the tribe Lissotrachelini, also proposed by the author. However, posteriorly he compared Tohila and Trigonidomimus with Paracophus and Cophus, but maintained his position in keeping them in Pentacentrinae (Hubbell, 1972). Desutter (1987; 1990) suggests an uncertain position, but since then, no additional specimens have been studied, nor any new taxonomic position has been proposed for Tohila.
In this contribution, it is suggested to place it in the tribe Otteiini, as it fits the external morphology and genitalia characters, mentioned in the diagnosis provided here. Tohila is the genus with more developed tegmina of the tribe, and the male genitalia is similar to the structure of Venegascophus n. gen., especially in the shape of the dorsal edges of the lateral lophi.
description: Published as part of Cadena-Castañeda, Oscar J., Soto, Wolfang Andrés Rodríguez, Cárdenas, Andrea Del Pilar Floréz & Acevedo, Angélica, 2021, Studies on Neotropical crickets: The continental Otteiini taxa (Orthoptera Phalangopsidae), those cave crickets are not confined to the West Indies, pp. 331-356 in Zootaxa 4981 (2) on page 334, DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.4981.2.7, http://zenodo.org/record/4920604