Species Tarophagus persephone (Kirkaldy, 1907)

Museums

Regional Maps

• Megamelus persephone Kirkaldy, G.W. 1907. Leafhoppers — Supplement (Hemiptera). Bulletin of the Hawaiian Sugar Planters' Association Experimental Station Entomological Series 3: 1-186 [148].

  Type data:

   Syntype(s) BPBM ♂, quantity unknown (coll.: vii-viii.1904), Cairns, Queensland.
• Tarophagus proserpina australis Fennah, R.G. 1965. Delphacidae from Australia and New Zealand (Homoptera: Fulgoroidea). Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History) Entomology 17(1): 1-59 [37].

  Type data:

   Holotype BMNH ♂ (coll.: 16.ii.1936, at light, R.W. Mungomery), Gordonvale, Queensland.
• Megamelus proserpinoides Muir, F. 1917. Homopterous Notes. Proceedings of the Hawaiian Entomological Society 3(4): 311-338 [327].

  Type data:

   Syntype(s) BPBM 1 ♂, 1 ♀ (Baker coll.), Davao, Mindanao, Philippines.

Taxonomic Decision for Synonymy

• Asche, M. & Wilson, M.R. 1989. The three taro planthoppers: species recognition in Tarophagus (Hemiptera : Delphacidae). Bulletin of Entomological Research 79: 285-298 [290] (synonymy of T. proserpina australis and M. proserpinoides)

Generic Combinations

• Tarophagus persephone (Kirkaldy, 1907). —
  Zimmerman, E.C. 1948. The Insects of Hawaii. Vol. 4, Homoptera: Auchenorrhyncha. Honolulu : University of Hawaii Press 268 pp. [245]

Introduction

This was the only species of the genus recorded in Australia by Asche & Wilson (1989) who recorded it from the wet tropics of North Queensland and the northern parts of the Northern Territory.

Distribution

States

Northern Territory, Queensland

IBRA and IMCRA regions

IBRA

NT, Qld: Darwin Coastal (DAC), Pine Creek (PCK), Wet Tropics (WT)

Ecological Descriptors

All stages: phloem feeder (associated flora: Colocasia esculenta (L.) Schott [ARACEAE] Taro).

Diagnosis

T. persephone can be distinguished from the two other Tarophagus species by the following characters: in the male genitalia, by the cone-shaped lateral ventrocaudal processes of the genital segment, by the straight and distally truncate parameres, by the distally widely bifurcate and basally broadly fused reflected processes of the aedeagus and by the rather long processes of the anal segment; in the females, by the absence of paired chitin-plates in the median membranous part between the sclerites of abdominal sternite V and by the lack of basal projections of valvifer VIII. The double-scale of abdominal sternite VI is asymmetrically incised in middle (Asche & Wilson 1989, who provide figures of these features and of the range of intraspecific variation of the ventrocaudal processes of the male genital segment).

ID Keys

Asche & Wilson 1989: 287–288

Diagnosis References

Asche, M. & Wilson, M.R. 1989. The three taro planthoppers: species recognition in Tarophagus (Hemiptera : Delphacidae). Bulletin of Entomological Research 79: 285-298 [290]

General References

Asche, M. & Wilson, M.R. 1989. The three taro planthoppers: species recognition in Tarophagus (Hemiptera : Delphacidae). Bulletin of Entomological Research 79: 285-298 [290]

History of changes