Tribe Rhotanini Muir, 1917

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Tribe Rhotanini Muir, 1917

Compiler and date details

17 January 2010 - Murray J. Fletcher

Rhotana Muir, F. 1917. The Derbidae of the Philippine Islands. Philippine Journal of Science 12: 49-105 [54].

Introduction

Although Metcalf (1945) credited Muir (1913) as the author of this tribe by referring to a Rhotana group, it was keyed out as part of a larger group which he regarded as being unnatural. This larger group included, on the one side, Derbe Fabricius and Mysidia Westwood which were more aligned with Muir's Zoraida group and, on the other side, "Nisia and its allies" which later became the Meenoplidae. In 1917, Muir redefined the Rhotanini (as the subfamily Rhotaninae) to exclude these other groups and modified his keys accordingly. It is therefore in Muir (1917) that this group was first defined, it being later relegated to tribal status by Muir (1918). Australia has two genera of Rhotanini with seven species, however recent work in New Guinea (Zelazny, in press) revealed a vast number of species many of which may occur unrecognised in northern Australia.

Diagnosis

Cubital veins ending in hind margin of tegmen; third claval cell closed; cubitus connected with first median sector, forming an angular or diamond-shaped cell, sometimes with a cross vein near base of first sector, forming a triangular cell (Muir 1917).

Stridulatory plate with concave external margin; clavus closed; stem of CuA on forewings with sensory pits (Emejlanov 1996).