New and little known species of the family Saldidae (heteroptera) from india and adjacent countries

Abstract

Data on 13 species of the family Saldidae distributed in India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Nepal, and Vietnam are reported. Two new species, Macrosaldula indica sp. n. (Himachal Pradesh) and Saldula pericarti sp. n. (Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh), are described from the Himalayas. Macrosaldula indica is similar to the dark specimens of M. scotica (Curtis, 1835) and M. variabilis variabilis (Herrich-Schaeffer, 1835) of the scotica group, but differs in a shorter body and in the structure of the genitalia. The montane Middle Asian M. tadzhika (Kiritshenko, 1912) is larger and differs from the new species in the color pattern of its fore wing and in a short and arched paramere. An isolated dark spot on the fore tibia and a pale pattern on the corium identify Saldula pericarti sp. n. as a member of the saltatoria group, but the species differs from the other members of this group in the presence of erect hairs on the head, antennae, pronotum, and wings (the character of the orthochila group). New records of Micracanthia minor Hamid et Sultana, 1972, comb. n., are made in Western and Eastern Pakistan. Micracanthia ornatula (Reuter, 1882) is found for the first time in Nepal and Vietnam, Saldula burmanica Lindskog, 1975 and S. palustris (Douglas, 1874), in Pakistan, and S. pilosella (Thomson, 1871), in Afghanistan.