Species Balclutha aurantiigera (Kirkaldy, 1907) (nomen dubium)

Museums

Regional Maps

• Nesosteles aurantiigera Kirkaldy, G.W. 1907. Leafhoppers — Supplement (Hemiptera). Bulletin of the Hawaiian Sugar Planters' Association Experimental Station Entomological Series 3: 1-186 [65].

  Type data:

   Lectotype BPBM ♀ (coll.: viii.1904, Perkins), Cairns, Queensland.

  Subsequent designation references:

  Fletcher, M.J. & Condello, A.A. 1993. Lectotype designations and new synonymies for G. W. Kirkaldy's Australian Deltocephalinae (Homoptera: Cicadellidae) held in the B.P. Bishop Museum, Honolulu. General and Applied Entomology 25: 35-59 [38].

Generic Combinations

• Balclutha aurantiigera (Kirkaldy, 1907). —
  Knight, W.J. 1987. Leafhoppers of the grass-feeding genus Balclutha (Homoptera, Cicadellidae) in the Pacific region. Journal of Natural History 21: 1173-1224 [1217]

Introduction

The identity of this species is currently uncertain. Evans (1977) synonymised it with Balclutha rubrostriata (Melichar) following a pers. comm. from J. Vilbaste but Knight (1987) excluded it from that species. It was based only on females and Knight (1987) referred to a female holotype. However, as pointed out by Medler (1987), Kirkaldy syntypes usually bear holotype and paratype labels which were placed on the specimens by a subsequent worker (possibly Fred Muir) and these have never been validated by publication. Knight's reference to a holotype may constitute a lectotype designation by default but Fletcher & Condello (1993) recognised the only female known as the lectotype.

Distribution

States

Queensland

IBRA and IMCRA regions

IBRA

Qld: Wet Tropics (WT)

Ecological Descriptors

All stages: phloem feeder.

Diagnosis

Head, pronotum and scutellum pale greenish-yellow. Tegmina and legs orange-red. the former with conspicuous whitish veins, the apical cells hyaline. Wings milky. Tergites fuscous, hind margin of the segments pale yellowish. Vertex rounded in front, less than half the length of the pronotum, about as long medianly as at the eyes. Length 4 mm. (Kirkaldy 1907).

Diagnosis References

Kirkaldy, G.W. 1907. Leafhoppers — Supplement (Hemiptera). Bulletin of the Hawaiian Sugar Planters' Association Experimental Station Entomological Series 3: 1-186 [65]

General References

Evans, J.W. 1977. The leafhoppers and froghoppers of Australia and New Zealand. Part 2. Records of the Australian Museum 31(3): 83-129 [120]

Fletcher, M.J. & Condello, A.A. 1993. Lectotype designations and new synonymies for G. W. Kirkaldy's Australian Deltocephalinae (Homoptera: Cicadellidae) held in the B.P. Bishop Museum, Honolulu. General and Applied Entomology 25: 35-59 [38]

Knight, W.J. 1987. Leafhoppers of the grass-feeding genus Balclutha (Homoptera, Cicadellidae) in the Pacific region. Journal of Natural History 21: 1173-1224 [1217] (nomen dubium)

Medler, J.T. 1987. Types of Flatidae (Homoptera) XI. Taxonomic notes on Kirkaldy Types in the Bishop Museum, with illustrations of the genitalia of male lectotypes. Bishop Museum Occasional Papers 27: 115-125 [115]

History of changes