The Wharton Lab

Silavoga longicornis Cameron, 1911: 190.
Neurogenia longicornis (Cameron): Townes (1970): 100.

This species is readily distinguished by the shape of the M+Cu spur (at least in the female) and flagellomeres that are dark throughout, from base to apex. The face is more granular than the densely but distinctly punctate face of several other Afrotropical species, and most other Afrotropical species have the flagellum pale at least basally.

This species is similar in many respects to Neurogenia ocellaris but N. longicornis is known for certain only from females and N. ocellaris only from males. In this regard, we have examined a putative male of longicornis that is much smaller (and with only 40 flagellomeres), that has the flagellum completely dark unlike the pale flagellum of ocellaris but the M+Cu spur is shorter and not bifurcate at the apex. The putative male is from Zambia, from the same locality as one of the typical females.

Face (Fig. 1) granular. Ocelli large in female, maximum diameter of lateral ocellus 1.3-1.5 x distance from ocellus to eye. Antenna with 48-50 flagellomeres. Fore wing (Fig. 6) with Rs+2r arising distad midpoint of stigma; M+Cu with well-developed ramus that is weakly bifurcate at the apex, ramus reclivous; 1M straight or nearly so (neither curved nor thickened), inclivous; 1cu-a distinctly distad of 1M (i.e. postfurcal). Hind wing with first abscissa of 1Cu in hind wing very short in all but one of the specimens examined, with cu-a very strongly inclivous. Mesopleuron heavily punctate on anterior half. Propodeum with areola open anteriorly (median section of basal transverse carina absent); propodeum usually heavily sculptured, often partly obscuring some of the carinae in the middle part of the propodeum.
Color: mostly uniformly pale yellow brown; flagellum dark throughout, with basal flagellomeres very slightly darker in lateral view than more distal flagellomeres.

Images are of the poorly preserved holotype from BMNH; the color of the specimen is natural, but the background has not been altered to enhance these images.

Originally described based on females from Kourulene, Zoutpansberg District (now part of Transvaal), South Africa (Repository: BMNH). We have also seen specimens from Zimbabwe and Zambia.

Biology unknown.

This page was assembled by Bob Wharton as part of a larger collaborative effort on the genera of Ctenopelmatinae, and as part of a study of this genus prepared by Heather Hendrickson and Bob Wharton. The work is based on specimens in the Texas A&M University collection as well as material borrowed from China, MRAC, CNC, BMNH, and AEIC. We are particularly grateful to Gavin Broad for assistance in making the holotype available for examination as well as David Wahl, Andy Bennett, Xue-xin Chen and Eliane De Coninck for assisting with loans. This work would also not have been possible without the groundwork provided by Ian Gauld’s study of the Australian and Costa Rican faunas, and we are particularly grateful for his assistance in many aspects of this study. We thank David Wahl for useful feedback throughout our study and to Gavin Broad for exchange of information on Perilissini. Matt Yoder provided considerable assistance with databasing issues, and our use of PURLs (http://purl.oclc.org) in this regard follows the example of their use in publications by Norm Johnson. Heather Hendrickson and Mika Cameron, graciously assisted with image capture, processing, formatting, and literature retrieval. Page last updated December, 2014.

This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant Number DEB 0328922 with REU supplements DEB 0723663 and number 1026618.
Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.