PROC. ENTOMOL. SOC. WASH. 106(3). 2004, pp. 697-704 DESCRIPTION OF THE LARVA OF PHAEOGALA RUFA ABDULLAH (COLEOPTERA: MYCTERIDAE: LACCONOTINAE), WITH NOMENCLATURAL NOTES FOR THE GENUS PHAEOGALA Darren A. Pollock and Michael A. Ivie (DAP) Department of Biology, Eastern New Mexico University, Portales, NM 88130, U.S.A. (e-mail:
[email protected]); (MAI) Department of Entomology, Montana State University, Bozeman, MT 59717, U.S.A. Abstract. — The mature larva of Phaeogala rufa Abdullah (Mycteridae: Lacconotinae) is described and illustrated, representing the first description of a mycterid larva from Madagascar. The larva of P. rufa is compared to all other described and several unde-scribed larvae of Lacconotinae. Aeschyntehis signatus (Grouvelle) (Bothrideridae: Both-riderini) and an unidentified chaetosomatid larva are reported to parasitize and prey upon P. rufa, respectively. The following new combinations and synonyms are proposed: Phaeogala Fairmaire 1896 = Falsostictodrya Pic 1931 new synonym, Phaeogala biim-pressa (Pic) new combination; Phaeogala breviscutata Fairmaire 1898 = Mimophyscius madecassus Pic, 1935 new synonym, Mimophyscius breviscutata (Fairmaire) new com-bination. Key Words: Madagascar, Mycteridae, Bothrideridae, Chaetosomatidae, larvae The lacconotine Mycteridae are a diverse assemblage of 20 described genera and over 100 species, especially well represented in tropical regions of the world, but known also from temperate Australia and North and South America (Blair 1928, Lawrence et al. 1999a). The taxonomy and systemat-ics of the group have not been treated com-prehensively, although this an ongoing re-search project (DAP, unpubl.). Despite the relatively large number of lacconotine taxa, only eight species, repre-senting five genera have formally described larvae. The described taxa are: Eurypus ruhens Kirby (Bondar 1940), Eurypus muelleri Seidlitz, Stilpnonotus postsignatus Fairmaire (Costa et al. 1988), Lacconotus pinicolus Horn (Lawrence 1991), Physcius fasciatus Pic (Pollock 1995), Physiomor-phus subcostulatus Pollock, Physiomorphus angustus Pollock and Physiomorphus me-lanurus (Champion) (Pollock et al. 2000). We add the larva of the first known Phaeo-gala species, and compare it to those lac-conotines previously described, as well as undescribed specimens assembled from several collections (Table 1). Phaeogala was described by Fairmaire (1896) in the Pedilidae, where it resided un-til Abdullah (1965) revised the genus (seemingly based solely on type material) and transferred the five included species to the lacconotine Mycteridae. Although Ab-dullah (1965) speculated that Phaeogala is related closely to the Chilean genus Lobog-lossa Solier, in the absence of an analysis, the phylogenetic relationships of Phaeogala remain unknown. Larval characters are ex-pected to provide useful data for such an analysis, and the larval description herein is a step toward providing these data.
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