Journal of Threatened Taxa |
www.threatenedtaxa.org | 26 October 2021 | 13(12): 19867–19869
ISSN 0974-7907 (Online) | ISSN 0974-7893
(Print)
https://doi.org/10.11609/jott.6463.13.12.19867-19869
#6463 | Received 22 July 2020 | Final
received 08 September 2021 | Finally accepted 28 September 2021
The genus Catapiestus
Perty, 1831 (Coleoptera:
Tenebrionidae: Cnodalonini)
from Arunachal Pradesh with one new record to India
V.D. Hegde 1 & Sarita Yadav 2
1,2 North Eastern Regional Centre,
Zoological Survey of India, Risa Colony, Shillong,
Meghalaya 793003, India.
1 hegde67@yahoo.co.in
(corresponding author), 2 saritayadavzsi18@gmail.com
Editor: Anonymity
requested. Date of publication:
26 October 2021 (online & print)
Citation: Hegde, V.D. & Sarita Yadav (2021). The genus Catapiestus
Perty, 1831 (Coleoptera: Tenebrionidae: Cnodalonini) from
Arunachal Pradesh with one new record to India. Journal of Threatened Taxa 13(12): 19867–19869. https://doi.org/10.11609/jott.6463.13.12.19867-19869
Copyright: © Hegde & Yadav 2021. Creative Commons Attribution
4.0 International License. JoTT allows unrestricted use, reproduction, and
distribution of this article in any medium by providing adequate credit to the
author(s) and the source of publication.
Funding: Based on the Annual Programme
of Research, Zoological Survey of India under the Ministry
of Environment,
Forest and Climate Change, Govt. of India.
Competing interests: The authors
declare no competing interests.
Acknowledgements: The authors are very thankful to the director, Zoological Survey
of India, Kolkata for the facilities. Special thanks to Bhaskar Saikia of ZSI, Shillong for his
help during the revision of the manuscript.
The genus Catapiestus
Perty, 1831 belongs to the tribe Cnodalonini (Tenebrionidae: Stenochiinae), and has at present 12 species in the
Oriental and Palaearctic regions, including four
species already reported from various parts of India, viz, Catapiestus
bourgoini Pic, 1912 from Malabar- Mahe, Catapiestus piceiventris Fairmaire, 1893
from Andaman Island, Catapiestus indicus Fairmaire, 1896 from Kanara & Sikkim, and Catapiestus subrufescens
Pic, 1911 from Dudhwa National Park, Uttar
Pradesh (Lang & Ren 2009; Hegde & Lal 2014). The species of this genus
have quite uniform characters – strongly flattened body form and coloration and
scarce or no apparent external sexual dimorphism (Lang & Ren 2009).
Morphological differentiation of the species mainly depends on features of the
pronotum and number of teeth or denticles of profemora
(Lang & Ren 2009). In the check-list of Tenebrionidae
of Arunachal Pradesh, Hegde (2019) reported only one species C. indicus.
Examination of the collection at North Eastern Regional Centre (NERC),
Zoological Survey of India (ZSI), Shillong, revealed
that there are three species C. subrufescens, C.
piceiventris, and C. rugipennis
collected from Arunachal Pradesh in 1982. These three species are new
records for Arunachal Pradesh while C. rugipennis (originally
described from Japan) is the first report from India.
Material and Methods: The
specimens were in the unidentified collection of NERC, ZSI, Shillong,
Meghalaya, which were identified up to species level by their morphological
characters following Lang & Ren (2009). The identified specimens were
registered and deposited in the national zoological collections of ZSI, Shillong. The images were taken with binocular microscope
using Leica DFC 450 camera.
Genus Catapiestus
Perty, 1831
Diagnostic features: The genus Catapiestus
was proposed by Perty (1831) with C. Piceus Perty, 1831 as type
species. Subsequently, one species was described by Guèrin-Mèneville
(1841), four species by Fairmaire (1888, 1893, 1896),
three species by Pic (1911, 1912), and one species by Chȗjȏ
(1984).
Body elongate, parallel sided,
strongly depressed, Body dark brown, with dense punctures. Head broad, space
between eyes broad, neck slender, and nearly cylindrical. Distal six segments
of antenna dilated. Maxillary palpus with apical segments strongly securiforme. The lateral margins of pronotum with
serrations, and the middle and/or lateral with depression. Elytra with distinct
punctures and striae. Legs slender, femur with or
without tooth, tibial spurs extremely underdeveloped, tarsi with hairs. There is
no distinct sexual dimorphism.
1. Catapiestus
subrufescens Pic, 1911
1911. Catapiestus
subrufescens Pic, L’Échange,
Revue Linnéenne 27: 134.
Material examined: Reg. No.
I/COL/NERC- 142, 24.viii.1982, 1 specimen (sex undiagnosed), Derok Forest, Tirap Dist.,
Arunachal Pradesh, India, coll. C. Radhakrishnan.
Diagnostic characters: Body
length: 16 mm, body blackish-brown, strongly depressed and with dense
punctures. Pronotum lateral margins curved with small radius, with more acute
serrations than upper, front, corner acute, hinder corner rounded, elytra
punctate striate, distal six segments of the antenna dilated (Image 1).
Distribution: India (Uttar
Pradesh and Arunachal Pradesh (New Record)), China, Taiwan (Type locality, Pic
1911; Lang & Ren 2009).
2. Catapiestus
piceiventris Fairmaire,
1893
1893. Catapiestus
piceiventris Fairmaire,
Notes from the Leyden Museum, 15: 29.
Material examined: Reg. No.
I/COL/NERC- 143, 24.viii.1982, 1 specimen (sex undiagnosed), Derak Forest, Tirap Dist.,
Arunachal Pradesh, India, coll. C. Radhakrishnan.
Diagnostic characters: Body
length: 14 mm, body blackish-brown, strongly depressed and with dense
punctures. Pronotum almost flat, middle with shallow depression with dense
puncture (Image 2).
Distribution: India (Andaman Island
(Type locality: Fairmaire 1893; Lang & Ren 2009)
and Arunachal Pradesh (New Record)).
3. Catapiestus
rugipennis Chûjô, 1984
1984. Catapiestus
rugipennis Chûjô, ESAKIA,
22: 1.
Material examined: Reg. No.
I/COL/NERC-144, 24.viii.1982, 1 specimen (sex undiagnosed), Derok
forest, Tirap Dist., Arunachal Pradesh, coll. C.
Radhakrishnan.
Diagnostic characters: Body
length: 14 mm. Body uniformly shining dark brown, strongly depressed. Elytra
punctuate striate with sparse, small punctures, punctures laterally connected
with fine reticulate. Profemur with one small tooth
on front ridge (Image 3).
Distribution: India (Arunachal
Pradesh (new India record)), Japan (Amami-Oshima
Island and Okinawa Honto Island (Type locality: Chûjô, 1984; Lang & Ren 2009)).
Discussion: The species of
the genus Catapiestus are mainly distributed
in the subtropical forests of southeastern Asia (Hegde & Lal 2014). Till
now only four species of Catapiestus are
reported from India. With the report of C. rugipennis
in this paper, the total number of known Catapiestus
species from India now stands at five.
From Arunachal Pradesh, only C.
indicus was previously reported (Hegde 2019). The report of C. subrufescens, C. Piceiventris,
and C .rugipennis constitutes the first
record from the state, thus raising the total number of Catapiestus
to four species for Arunachal Pradesh.
The known diversity of Catapiestus populations in India is disjunct
and largely known from the northeastern states of Arunachal Pradesh and Sikkim,
along with Uttar Pradesh and the southern state of Karnataka and Puducherry
from the Malabar Coast as well as Andaman Islands (Fairmaire
1893, 1896; Pic 1912; Hegde & Lal 2014; Hegde 2019). The current report of
this group from Arunachal Pradesh (in Tirap) is from
the lower altitudinal areas which suggest that the other hill states of
northeastern India might harbour yet unknown
populations of this genus, as the entire area comes under the confluence of the
eastern Himalaya and the Indo-Burma biodiversity hotspots. As the hilly states
of northeastern India are still largely inaccessible and poorly surveyed, there
is a dearth of documentation of insect fauna from the region, which is probably
the reason why the known diversity of Catapiestus
is still low.
A key to the India Catapiestus fauna is provided for the benefit of
easy taxonomic identification
The middle longitudinal groove on
pronotum distinct …..................................................… 2
The
middle longitudinal groove on pronotum indistinct ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ........ C.
indicus
Transverse groove on the anterior
pronotum absent ..... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ........ 3
Transverse
groove on the anterior pronotum present .............………….….. C. subrufescens
Pronotum without puncture
posteriorly .................. ... ... ... ... ...... ... ... ............... 4
Pronotum
with puncture posteriorly ………….................................…...… C. bourgoini
Anterior pronotum lifted .........................… ... ... ... ... ...
... ... ...…..… C. rugipennis
Anterior
pronotum depressed ….........................................………. C. piceiventris
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