Species Batracomorphus punctatus (Kirby, 1900)

Museums

Regional Maps

• Idiocerus punctatus Kirby, W.F. 1900. Homoptera. pp. 130-138 in Andrews, C.W. (ed.). A Monograph of Christmas Island (Indian Ocean): physical features and geology; with descriptions of the fauna and flora by numerous contributors. London : British Museum (Natural History) xiii 337 pp. [138].

  Type data:

   
  Syntype(s) BMNH sex, quantity unknown (viii.1897), East Coast, Christmas Island; BMNH sex, quantity unknown (x.1897), Flying Fish Cove, Christmas Island.; BMNH sex, quantity unknown (i.1898), North Coast, Christmas Island
  Comment: Total syntypes = 5. Knight (1983) referred to a holotype ♂ from Flying Fish Cove which may represent a lectotype designation by default.

Generic Combinations

• Batracomorphus punctatus (Kirby, 1900). —
  Knight, W.J. 1983. The leafhopper genus Batracomorphus (Cicadellidae) in the eastern Oriental and Australian Regions. Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History) Entomology 47(2): 27-210 [127]

Introduction

This species is restricted to Christmas Island in the Indian Ocean.

Distribution

Other Regions

Christmas Island terrestrial & freshwater

Ecological Descriptors

All stages: phloem feeder.

Diagnosis

Almost uniform testaceous, darkest on the thorax which is sculptured with transverse striae. The front of the thorax is sometimes speckled with brown and the hinder part and base of the scutellum are marked with four rather indistinct brownish bands. Ocelli in the middle of the front, about twice as far apart as each is distant from the margin of the eye. Tegmina with longitudinal rows of brown setiferous punctures and with a brown spot on the inner margin towards the end of the vein of the clavus. Hind tibiae long, whitish, strongly ciliated. Long. corp. com. tegm. 5 mm; long. tegm 3.5 mm (Kirby 1900).

Male pygophore processes slender, directed posteriorly to midlength and then dorsoposteriorly, slightly sinuate, apex acute, a small subapical spur on ventral margin. Styles with apical process expanded over distal half, tapering to short acute dorsally hooked apex, ventral margin acuminate subapically. Aedeagus simple; shaft directed dorsally, turning slightly anterodorsally at midlength; gonopore extending to just basad of midlength of shaft; anterior incision slightly shorter than gonopore (Knight 1983).

ID Keys

Knight 1983: 37–50

Diagnosis References

Kirby, W.F. 1900. Homoptera. pp. 130-138 in Andrews, C.W. (ed.). A Monograph of Christmas Island (Indian Ocean): physical features and geology; with descriptions of the fauna and flora by numerous contributors. London : British Museum (Natural History) xiii 337 pp. [138]

Knight, W.J. 1983. The leafhopper genus Batracomorphus (Cicadellidae) in the eastern Oriental and Australian Regions. Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History) Entomology 47(2): 27-210 [127]

History of changes