Another puzzle piece in the systematics of the chewing louse genus Myrsidea, with a description of a new genus Apomyrsidea

Stanislav Kolencik,Oldřich Sychra,Julie M Allen

doi:10.5852/ejt.2021.748.1339

Stanislav Kolencik, Oldřich Sychra + Show 1 more

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https://doi.org/10.5852/ejt.2021.748.1339

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Abstract

A new avian chewing louse genus Apomyrsidea gen. nov. is described based on species parasitizing birds in the family Formicariidae. Diagnostic characteristics and phylogenetic analyses were used to evaluate and confirm the generic status and merit its recognition as unique and different from Myrsidea Waterston, 1915. Three species previously belonging to the genus Myrsidea are placed in the new genus Apomyrsidea gen. nov. and are discussed: Apomyrsidea circumsternata (Valim & Weckstein, 2013) gen. et comb. nov., Apomyrsidea isacantha (Valim & Weckstein, 2013) gen. et comb. nov. and Apomyrsidea klimesi (Sychra in Sychra et al., 2006) gen. et comb. nov.

Highlights

Chewing lice (Psocodea Hennig, 1966: Phthiraptera Haeckel, 1896) are obligate permanent ectoparasites, meaning they live their entire life cycle on their hosts (Clayton et al 2015)
We find that the combination of differences found from both morphological and molecular data is strong enough to merit their recognition in a separate genus here named as Apomyrsidea gen. nov
The simple combination of the presence of the posterior dorsal head seta 23 and the dorso-central pronotal setae 2 (Fig. 3), sternite I lying inside the wide notch of sternite II (Fig. 5) and different type of fusion in the terminal sternites – male abdominal sternite VIII and female sternite VII both at least partially but conspicuously separated from the subgenital plate, which is formed by a single sternite IX or fusion of sternites VIII and IX, make these species distinct

Summary

Introduction

Chewing lice (Psocodea Hennig, 1966: Phthiraptera Haeckel, 1896) are obligate permanent ectoparasites, meaning they live their entire life cycle on their hosts (Clayton et al 2015). The chewing lice genus Myrsidea Waterston, 1915 is among the most diverse and host specific genera within the parasitic lice (Phthiraptera), with more than 380 species described worldwide (Kolencik & Sychra, unpublished data). While there are 49 species of Myrsidea described from Neotropical suboscine birds (Kolencik et al 2018), only three have been described from birds of the family Formicariidae Gray, 1840 (Sychra et al 2006; Valim & Weckstein 2013) These three species show a set of characteristics that are unique among all species of Myrsidea to the extent that Sychra et al (2006) and Valim & Weckstein (2013) suggested that they may be placed outside of Myrsidea. We find that the combination of differences found from both morphological and molecular data is strong enough to merit their recognition in a separate genus here named as Apomyrsidea gen. nov

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