A New Combination in the Genus Bergicoris (Heteroptera: Rhyparochromidae: Myodochini), with Distributional Data for Some Species

Abstract

The genus Pseudocnemodus was erected by Barber (1911) to include the new species P. bruneri that was subsequently synonymized under P. canadensis (Provancher) by Van Duzee (1912). This species is distributed in eastern Canada and the United States (Ashlock and Slater 1988), and shows a unique stridulatory mechanism among the Myodochini (Harrington 1980), formed by a stridulitrum over the propleuron and lateral surface of the head, and a plectrum as a row of tubercles on the profemur. Brailovsky (1981) described the second species in the genus, P. martinezi, based on a single male from Paraguay with a stridulitrum over the propleura, but ‘visible only when a beam of intense light falls on it’. Brailovsky and Barrera (1984) noted the affinities between two Neotropical species of the genus Cnemodus Herrich-Schaeffer, C. albimaculus Berg and C. multifarius Berg, and P. martinezi, and pointed out that these three species represented a new genus. Dellape´ (2008, 2010) established the new genus Bergicoris to include B. albimaculus (Berg), B. multifarius (Berg), and the new species B. riojanus. Dellape´ (2008) also showed that the description and photograph of P. martinezi in Brailovsky’s (1981) paper indicated that it appeared to be congeneric with the species included in Bergicoris.