Species Rosopaella cuprea (Walker, 1851)

Museums

Regional Maps

• Bythoscopus cupreus Walker, F. 1851. List of the Specimens of Homopterous Insects in the Collection of the British Museum. London : British Museum (Natural History) Vol. 3 pp. 637-907. [871].

  Type data:

   Lectotype BMNH ♀ (Mr Argent's collection), 'Australia'.

  Subsequent designation references:

  Webb, M.D. 1983. Revision of the Australian Idiocerinae (Hemiptera: Homoptera: Cicadellidae). Australian Journal of Zoology Supplementary Series 92: 1-147 [20].
• Idiocerus seckeri Evans, J.W. 1936. The Bythoscopidae of Australia (Homoptera: Jassoidea). Papers and Proceedings of the Royal Society of Tasmania 1935: 61-83 [79].

  Type data:

   Holotype SAMA ♂ (coll.: F. Secker), Lucindale, South Australia.

 

Taxonomic Decision for Synonymy

• Evans, J.W. 1966. The leafhoppers and froghoppers of Australia and New Zealand. Memoirs of the Australian Museum 12: 1-347 [177] (synonymy of I. seckeri)

 

Generic Combinations

• Rosopaella cuprea (Walker, 1851). —
  Webb, M.D. 1983. Revision of the Australian Idiocerinae (Hemiptera: Homoptera: Cicadellidae). Australian Journal of Zoology Supplementary Series 92: 1-147 [19]
• Idiocerus cupreus (Walker, 1851). —
  Evans, J.W. 1966. The leafhoppers and froghoppers of Australia and New Zealand. Memoirs of the Australian Museum 12: 1-347 [177]

 

Introduction

This species is beautifully marked with dark wings bearing two pale transverse bands. Unfortunately, this colouring is also found in a number of other species of the genus. Walker's (1851) original description states that the species is rufous, which it isn't, although females do not have as much dark brown colouring on the body as the males and Walker's two specimens were both females. The species is distributed around the southeastern parts of Australia, although no records appear to exist of the species in Victoria. This is presumably an artefact of collecting and the species almost certainly occurs there.

 

Distribution

States

New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania

Extra Distribution Information

Australian Endemic.

IBRA and IMCRA regions

IBRA

NSW, Qld, SA, Tas: Brigalow Belt South (BBS), Murray Darling Depression (MDD), Naracoorte Coastal Plain (NCP), Sydney Basin (SB), South Eastern Highlands (SEH), Tasmanian Northern Midlands (TNM), Tasmanian South East (TSE), Tasmanian West (TWE), Victorian Midlands (VM)

Ecological Descriptors

All stages: phloem feeder (associated flora: Acacia sp. [FABACEAE] Wattle).

 

Diagnosis

Rufus; facies scutique latera alba; pectus et abdomen nigra; pedes flavi; alae anticae limpidae, cupreo trifasciatae
Pale red: head full as broad as the chest, very short; crown rounded in front, equally long across the whole breadth, which.excluding the eyes, is about thrice the length; hind border and face whitish, the latter flat, slightly tinged in part with very pale red; epistoma very small; shield very finely striated across, convex in front, almost straight along the hind border, white on each side; breast and abdomen black; legs pale yellow; fore-wings colourless, with three coppery ferruginous bands, one at the base, the third at the tip; veins ferruginous: hind-wings colourless. Length of the body 2 lines; of the wings 5 lines. (Walker 1851).

Head pale sordid yellow, sometimes tinged with stramineous. Pronotum yellow, whitish or sordid yellow; female with a faint brown longitudinal stripe on each side; male with dark brown stripes, sometimes widening and uniting medially, sometimes combined with dark brown lateral margins of pronotum forming a pale band each side of midline. Scutellum yellow, marked with brown in female or nearly entirely dark brown in male. Forewings brownish hyaline with two broad transverse whitish bands, one from middle of clavus and one from basal half of appendix; veins concolorous with cells, or scarlet. Legs yellow, marked with brown on posterior tibia and variably on posterior femur and middle and fore femur and tibia. Abdomen dark brown marked with yellow. Male genitalia with subgenital plates relatively short and broad, increasing in width towards apex, ventroapical heel indistinct; dorsal marginal setae long, becoming shorter apically. Styles with preapical angle moderately wide. Aedeagus with basal stem expanded distally, dorsoposterior neck short to moderately long; dorsal margin with a flange near each side of gonopore; without anterior processes from dorsal margin. Female genitalia with teeth of second valvulae extended to near midlength of valvulae; expanded apex of third valvulae about half length of narrow basal region and etended about half its length beyond pygophore. (Webb 1983)

 

ID Keys

Webb 1983: 7–10

 

Diagnosis References

Walker, F. 1851. List of the Specimens of Homopterous Insects in the Collection of the British Museum. London : British Museum (Natural History) Vol. 3 pp. 637-907. [871–872]

Webb, M.D. 1983. Revision of the Australian Idiocerinae (Hemiptera: Homoptera: Cicadellidae). Australian Journal of Zoology Supplementary Series 92: 1-147 [19–20]

 

History of changes

Published	As part of group	Action Date	Action Type	Compiler(s)
26-Jun-2023	MEMBRACOIDEA	26-Jun-2023	MODIFIED
10-May-2022	CICADOMORPHA	24-May-2023	MODIFIED
02-Jun-2021	AUCHENORRHYNCHA	26-Jun-2023	MODIFIED
05-Dec-2019	CICADELLIDAE Latreille, 1825	26-Jun-2023	MODIFIED	Dr Murray Fletcher
05-Dec-2019	Idiocerinae Baker, 1915	26-Jun-2023	MODIFIED	Dr Murray Fletcher
05-Dec-2019		26-Jun-2023	MODIFIED
		26-Jun-2023	MODIFIED