Research Article |
Corresponding author: Igor Souza-Gonçalves ( igao_bio@yahoo.com.br ) Academic editor: Yasen Mutafchiev
© 2018 Igor Souza-Gonçalves, Cristiano Lopes-Andrade.
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Citation:
Souza-Gonçalves I, Lopes-Andrade C (2018) The Cis bilamellatus species-group (Coleoptera, Ciidae) in southern Africa: Cis mooihoekite sp. n. and new distributional records. African Invertebrates 59(1): 25-35. https://doi.org/10.3897/afrinvertebr.59.22269
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Cis mooihoekite sp. n. is described based on specimens collected at two localities in the province of Mpumalanga, South Africa. The new species is included in the Cis bilamellatus species-group, which comprises species with a single plate on both anterocephalic edge and anterior pronotal edge in males, females with pronotum usually widest near the posterior end and gradually narrowing anteriorly and both sexes with dual elytral vestiture. Cis mooihoekite sp. n. can be distinguished from the other South African species in the group by the pronotum devoid of a median impunctate line, pronotal plate angularly emarginate forming two small and triangular horns with acute apex and anterocephalic edge with very acute corners. New geographical records and information on the host fungi of Cis pickeri Lopes-Andrade, Matushkina, Buder & Klass, 2009 are provided.
Minute tree-fungus beetles, Ciinae , Ciini , Ethiopian, Western Cape Province
Cis Latreille is the most diverse genus of Ciidae with about 400 described species and a worldwide distribution (
The sub-Saharan Ciidae are represented by 72 described species (
Cis pickeri is the only species belonging to the Cis bilamellatus species-group described from the Ethiopian region (biogeographic regions sensu
The aim of this paper is to describe a new species of Cis belonging to the bilamellatus-group and provide new geographical records of this group in southern Africa.
Museum abbreviations are as follows:
CELC Coleção Entomológica do Laboratório de Sistemática e Biologia de Coleoptera da Universidade Federal de Viçosa (Viçosa, Minas Gerais, Brazil)
The new species described here and additional material of C. pickeri were collected and documented by the staff of the
Terms for external morphology and male terminalia of ciids follow
Transcription of labels, dissection, photography and measurement of specimens follow the methods provided by
“Mooihoek Farm” (near Wakkerstroom), coordinates 27°13'S, 30°32'E (Pixley Ka Seme Local Municipality, Gert Sibande District, Mpumalanga Province).
The species name refers to the mooihoekite, a copper iron sulphide mineral, which was discovered in 1972 in South Africa and bears a sheen that resembles the dorsal colour of this species.
The new species differs from C. pickeri, as described by
Cis mooihoekite sp. n. Male holotype (Figs 1–7): 1 Dorsal view, note acute corners of male anterocephalic edge (arrows) 2 Lateral view 3 Part of first abdominal ventrite, showing sex patch (arrow) 4 Ventral view, note prosternal carina (yellow arrow), abdominal sex patch (white arrow) and acute corners of anterocephalic edge (black arrows) 5 Oblique view of head, pronotum and part of anterior portion of elytra with scutellar shield 6 Frontal view of head and pronotum, note frontal lamina of head (arrow) 7 Dorsal view of anterior portion of elytra with scutellar shield, pronotum and part of head; note small triangular horns of pronotal plate (large arrows) and acute corners of anterocephalic edge (small arrows) 8 Female paratype. Scale bars: 0.5 mm (1–2, 4, 8); 0.1 mm (3); 0.2 mm (5–7).
Male holotype (Figs
Male paratypes. Terminalia (Figs
Cis mooihoekite sp. n., sclerites of aedeagus of a paratype from the type locality; the anterior ends are placed to the right and the posterior ends are placed to the left. 9 Sternite VIII 10 Basal piece (top) and gross outline of basal piece (bottom) 11 Tegmen (top) and gross outline of tegmen excluding membranes (bottom), note emarginations near apex (arrows) 12 Penis. Scale bar: 0.1 mm.
Female paratypes (Fig.
Holotype: ♂ (
Thelephora sp. (Thelephoraceae), one record; and Trametes versicolor (L.) Lloyd (Polyporaceae), two records.
Cis mooihoekite sp. n. was collected in two localities: one in the northern Mpumalanga, dominated by Grassland (Mooihoek Farm); and the other in southern Mpumalanga, dominated by Savannah (Transvaal). Both localities are 1,000 m a.s.l. and have urban areas (Fig.
This species corresponds to Cis sp. I in
10 ♂♂ (4 CELC; 6
Laetiporus sp. (Fomitopsidaceae), one record; Russula capensis A. Pearson (Russulaceae), one record; and Trametes versicolor (L.) Lloyd (Polyporaceae), one breeding record.
Cis pickeri was described based on specimens from two field collections: one during the Swedish South Africa Expedition in the 1950s (at Viljoenspas) and the other to the Western Cape Province in 2003 (at Ceres) (
This additional material was collected together with C. neserorum, the morphospecies Cis sp. C, Cis sp. D, Cis sp. H, Cis sp. J, Cis sp. Q, Cis sp. S, Cis sp. Y (see explanation on morphospecies’ coding in the section on Materials and Methods) and the invasive species Cer. tabellifer.
Cis mooihoekite sp. n. is here included in the bilamellatus-group, which is characterised by the following features (based on
Amongst African species, Cis mooihoekite sp. n. not only differs from C. pickeri in the features mentioned in the section on “Diagnosis”, but also in its geographic distribution. Cis mooihoekite sp. n. occurs only in areas of Grassland or Savannah at Mpumalanga Province, far from the coast, while C. pickeri occurs only in areas of Fynbos vegetation at Western Cape Province, close to the coast (Fig.
Amongst non-African species of the bilamellatus-group, Cis mooihoekite sp. n. mostly resembles C. onyosi from Spain and C. clarki and C. setiferus from Australia. It differs from C. onyosi in the anterocephalic edge with corners more acute and further away from the median anterocephalic plate (Fig.
Except for C. onyosi, all described species of the bilamellatus-group occur in the Southern Hemisphere, mostly in subtropical and temperate areas (
We would like to especially thank John F. Lawrence, who first recognised the new species in the material belonging to