This was the second of a two-week test of use of Australian denatured ethanol as the collecting medium. I will return to isopropyl again for the next few weeks, awaiting feedback from Guelph on the first isopropyl samples submitted.
Many thanks to Charles Godfray for the first non-spam comment submitted to this blog.
This week, the sample was collected using 95% denatured ethanol. This is a test of the effect of the denaturing compound used in Australian ethanol (Denatoium Bensonate 5ppm MIBK) on samples for barcoding.
This week’s sample included three individuals of a Ulonemia (Hemiptera: Tingidae) species that seems not to be Ulonemia burckhardti, which had already been recorded. According to Shofner 2018 that species has “metasternal carinae straight, parallel, width equal to mesosternal carinae”, whereas the new insects show significant widening of these carinae relative to the mesosternal carinae.
A Camponotus specimen in the sample was heavily infested with small dark discs, apparently the spores of a fungus, most likely Myrmicinosporidium durum, although all records of this parasite to date seem to be from the northern hemisphere.
The sample also included the first plume moth for the project, one individual of Stenoptilia zophodactylus (Duponchel, 1840), a species of near-global distribution.
I’ve been trying to include images of interesting species that recur on multiple weeks in the hope that this makes it easier for me to understand phenology and seasonal change in community composition. I expect increasingly to use portmanteau images that show several of these species at once. For the time being, I’ve added some functionality so I can quickly crop smaller images from the views of the entire sample and use these to highlight these records.
This week’s sample included the first mantis, the first representatives of the wasp families Gasteruptiidae and Mymaridae and the first “dustywing” (Neuroptera: Coniopterygidae) for the project.
I also changed the aperture on the DSLR image of the sample to improve the depth of field and (finally) put a little effort into white(r) balance for the stereomicroscope photos.
This week’s images again focus on Hymenoptera in the sample, with several interesting Tiphiidae and large numbers of smaller wasps (Pteromalidae, Chrysididae, etc.).
Among the chrysidoid wasps were one male and one female of the subfamily Elasminae (Eulophidae). The pale hind tibiae of the female clearly show the diamond pattern that Riek, 1967 offers as diagnostic for the genus Elasmus. The female seems to key out cleanly as Elasmus margiscutellum Girault, 1915, a species recorded from Canberra (Mount Majura). The male seems close to Riek’s description of the male of Elasmus aquila Girault, 1912, particularly in the enlarged posterior bristles on the scutellum, although that species has pale fore coxae. The male of Elasmus margiscutellum is not described in Riek.
One of the flies captured this week seems to have been parasitised by a nematode or other “worm” that has apparently hollowed out at least the interior of each compound eye. The fly had no wings remaining and the head was rotated through 180°. Finding information on parasites of insect eyes is very difficult since searches repeatedly return pages on insect parasites of human and animal eyes. Any information on clades that destroy the eyes of flies would be welcome. I assume that the parasite also controlled the fly’s behaviour to climb upward (and fall into the sampling bottle) despite being so badly compromised.
This week’s sample images again focus on the diversity of parasitic Hymenoptera appearing in the Malaise trap.
A new species for the trap was Ulonemia burckhardti (Hemiptera: Tingidae). The photo of the parallel sides to the channel on the underside that holds the rostrum at rest confirms that this is the correct species, according to the 2018 thesis by Ryan Shofner: Taxonomy and Phylogenetics of the genus Ulonemia Drake and Poor, 1937 (Heteroptera: Tingidae), with an emphasis on the population genetics of a pestiferous species. This thesis informally proposes the ultimate move of this species to a new genus named Proteatingis.
The week included a few cooler days and biomass in the trap was lower than the previous two weeks.
Photographs this week include several species ichneumonoid wasps that resemble others caught in recent weeks, but also many species not previously caught or photographed.
One of the cicadas caught this week and last week has been identified by David Emery as Yoyetta robertsonae Moulds, Popple & Emery 2020. The type locality for this recently described species is within meters of the Malaise trap. See the paper here: A new species of Yoyetta Moulds from south-eastern Australia with notes on relationships within the Yoyetta tristrigata species group (Hemiptera, Cicadidae, Cicadettini).