Species Australomochlonyx nitidus Freeman, 1962

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Regional Maps

• Australomochlonyx nitidus Freeman, P. 1962. Notes on Chaoboridae (Diptera: Nematocera), with descriptions of a new genus and of two new species from Australia and Africa. Proceedings of the Royal Entomological Society of London B 31: 41-43 [41].

  Type data:

   Holotype BMNH ♂ adult (24.x.1960, J. Martin), Bright, VIC.

  Type locality references:

  Colless, D.H. 1986. The Australian Chaoboridae (Diptera). Australian Journal of Zoology Supplementary Series 124: 1-66 [26].

 

Distribution

States

New South Wales, Victoria

Extra Distribution Information

Australian Endemic.

IBRA and IMCRA regions

drainage basins and coastal and oceanic zones

IBRA

NSW, Vic: Australian Alps (AA), Brigalow Belt South (BBS), Broken Hill Complex (BHC), Cobar Peneplain (CP), Darling Riverine Plains (DRP), Flinders (FLI), Murray Darling Depression (MDD), Mulga Lands (ML), Nandewar (NAN), Naracoorte Coastal Plain (NCP), New England Tablelands (NET), NSW North Coast (NNC), NSW South Western Slopes (NSS), Riverina (RIV), Sydney Basin (SB), South East Coastal Plain (SCP), South East Corner (SEC), South Eastern Highlands (SEH), South Eastern Queensland (SEQ), Victorian Midlands (VM), Victorian Volcanic Plain (VVP)

Original AFD Distribution Data

Australian Region

• Australia
  • New South Wales: Murray-Darling basin, SE coastal
  • Victoria

Ecological Descriptors

Adult: volant.

Larva: filter-feeder.

 

Diagnosis

Female
Head. Occiput dark brown with grey pruinosity, hairs golden; latter not extending on to frontal macula. Eyes with dorso-internal angles acute but lying well laterad of antennal bases.
Antenna: pedicel brown, but pale on section basal to hair-whorl; flagellar hairs dark. Rostrum length c. 1.3 x distance from its base to vertex of head; clypeus and labrum light brown, the former darkened towards base, both with profuse, short golden hairs; palp mainly light brown, paler on apical half of segment 4 and near base of segment 2; segments 1 arid 2 with golden hairs, often with dark hairs; segment 4 about as long as rostrum.
Thorax. Anterior pronotum pale yellow with golden hairs; posterior pronotum greyish, translucent. Mesonotum dark brown, shining, with short, scale-like, dark hairs anteriorly and longer dark ones laterally, elsewhere with short golden hairs; 1-2 postalar setae. Scutellum and postnotum dark brown, the former with short golden hairs and long dark bristles that are pale towards their bases. Pleura dark brown, shining, dorsally with a broad, pale, silvery pruinose longitudinal band on c. the central third; ventral third dark, pruinose. Setae: propleural c. 5-6, pale; sternopleural c. 6-10, pale; pteropleural c. 4-6 dark, inconspicuous. Haltere with pale stem and dark knob, the latter with profuse dark setulae.
Legs. Coxae and trochanters pale, with pale hairs; femora and tibiae pale brown with dark hairs, the femora darkened at apices, the tibiae at bases; basal tarsal segments brown, the more apical ones darker.
Wing. Unornamented. Veins with fine, linear scales, pale on stem-vein, otherwise brown. Scales at alula-squama junction also pale. Sc relatively short, but stems of fork-cells likewise, so that radial fork lies about level with, or a little proximal to, apex of Sc; medial fork usually slightly distal to radial fork. Squamal fringe almost complete, ending a little short of base. Ambient vein well-haired along posterior margin.
Abdomen. Integument rather shiny, hairs mainly dark brown except on terminalia. Tergite 1 mainly pale, irregularly darkened medially; tergites 2-7 with apical pale bands, expanded laterally on tergites 2-6, incomplete laterally on tergite 7; tergies 4-7 or 5-7 with pale, basal, medial spot or narrow band. Sternites 1-6 largely pale, with sublateral dark patches; sternite 7 mainly dark on apical half. Apicolateral lobes of ster'nite 7 each with tuft of bright golden bristles.

Male
Generally resembling female. Flagellar segments 1-11 pale except around bases of hairwhorls. Abdominal segments more extensively darkened. Genitalia: Coxites dark brown, styles paler. Style with numerous setae on basal half and small setulae on apical third. Penis valves terminating in a transverse row of 3 small teeth.

 

Diagnosis References

Colless, D.H. 1986. The Australian Chaoboridae (Diptera). Australian Journal of Zoology Supplementary Series 124: 1-66 [26-27]

 

General References

Colless, D.H. 1977. A possibly unique feeding mechanism in a dipterous larva (Diptera: Culicidae: Chaborinae). Journal of the Australian Entomological Society 16: 335-339 [335] (larval morphology and biology)

Colless, D.H. 1986. The Australian Chaoboridae (Diptera). Australian Journal of Zoology Supplementary Series 124: 1-66 [26] (taxonomy)

 

History of changes

Published	As part of group	Action Date	Action Type	Compiler(s)
10-Jun-2011		29-Sep-2015	MODIFIED
		12-Feb-2010	(import)