Enigmatic thread-legged bug (Ploiaria enigmatica) from Western Ghats, Maharashtra, India

NEWS - A new species enigmatic thread-legged bug (Ploiaria enigmatica, Hemiptera: Heteroptera: Reduviidae: Emesinae: Leistarchini) from the Western Ghats, Maharashtra, India, has a series of interesting characters not found in any Indomalayan member of Ploiaria (Scopoli, 1786) and appears morphologically similar to some Afrotropical relatives.

The Ploiaria species is about 4 mm long and is the only known apterous morph for both sexes. The new species is easily recognized among the Indomalayan species of the genus by its forelegs which have a single long and strong spine-like seta located on a tall basal process on the ventral surface of the trochanter.

Five long and strong processes, some of which are longer than the maximum width of the femur and four long spines with short bases on the tibia. Furthermore, abdominal tergites IV-VII are each provided with a median tubercle located on the posterior edge of the segment. The pygophore is equipped with a broad, truncated and shallowly marginated superoposterior process.

Swapnil Boyane of Texas Tech University in Lubbock and colleagues named the new species from the Latin adjective enigmaticus meaning “enigmatic, puzzling”, referring to the unusual morphology of the new species and its enigmatic resemblance to certain African species rather than any Indomalayan Ploiaria members.

Three Ploiaria species have been recorded from India so far: P. anak (Distant 1909), P. soudanica (Dispons, 1960) and P. raviaspinosa (Pansare, Ghate & Webb, 2018). P. soudanica specimen collected in India and the type specimen of P. raviaspinosa are untraceable and are not available for actual comparison. However, it is clear that none of the above three Ploiaria species is identical to P. enigmatica.

Interestingly, P. enigmatica is morphologically very similar to some of its Afrotropical relatives P. tuberculata, P. decorata and the North African P. berlandi. It is not clear whether the morphological similarities of these species indicate a phylogenetic relationship or are the result of parallel evolution. P. enigmatica in two climatic habitats: one semi-arid and one very humid

The number of Ploiaria apterous recorded from India is now four species, although P. soudanica is highly doubtful, while P. nuda and P. mellea are so far unverified. The exploration of this genus in the Indian Subcontinent and the Western Ghats is far from satisfactory and it is thought that many species are still unrecorded and undescribed.

Original research

Hemant V. Ghate, Swapnil S. Boyane, Balasaheb V. Sarode, Pratik P. Pansare & Dávid rédei (2024). A new apterous species of the genus Ploiaria (Hemiptera: Heteroptera: Reduviidae) from Maharashtra, India. Zootaxa 5507 (4): 565–578, https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.5507.4.4, DOI:10.11646/zootaxa.5507.4.4

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