Urophora dzieduszyckii Frauenfeld, 1867

Urophora dzieduszyckii Frauenfeld, 1867 View in CoL ( Figs 1–16)

Urophora dzieduszyckii View in CoL : Frauenfeld, 1867: 498; Wierzejski, 1867: 176, 177; Foote, 1984: 141; Korneyev & White, 1992: 689; Korneyev & White, 1993: 36; Korneyev, 1996: 526; Korneyev, 2009: 287; Korneyev et al., 2016a: 46; 2016b: 52.

Urophora wodzickii : Frauenfeld 1867: 502; Foote, 1984: 141.

Euribia dzieduszyckii : Hendel, 1927: 43; Hering, 1953: 2.

Euribia syriaca View in CoL : Hendel, 1927: 49; Hering, 1953: 3; Foote, 1984: 145.

Euribia erichi-schmidti View in CoL : Hering, 1953: 2.

Euribia erichischmidti View in CoL : Steyskal, 1979: 9; Foote, 1984: 145; White & Korneyev, 1989: 362.

Urophora turkiyensis Yaran & Kütük, 2014: 151 , syn. n.

Material examined. Type. Lectotype ♀ Urophora dzieduszyckii : [ Ukraine: Ternopil : Synkiv, 48.62°N, 25.94°E]: “25/6 Sn” (blue paper, Wierzejski handwriting) [25.06.1866], “Alte Sammlung” (designated by V. Korneyev, 1996), marked with red label “Leclotypus Urophora dzieduszyckii Frfld. des. V. Korneyev 1995” ( NHMW) GoogleMaps . Paralectotypes Urophora dzieduszyckii ’: 1 ♂: “Podolia/1867” (Frauenfeld’s handwriting), “25/6 Sn”, “Dzieduszyckii / Alte Sammlung ” (O. Müller handwriting) ; 1 ♀, “25/6 Sn”, “Coll. Hendel”, here designated, marked with red labels “ Paralectotypus Urophora dzieduszyckii Frfld. des. V.Korneyev 1995” ( NHMW) ; 1 ♂, “25/6 Sn”, “ Urophora dzieduszyckii Frfld. Typus” (F. Kowarz handwriting), marked with red labels “ Syntypus Urophora dzieduszyckii Frfld. des. V. Komeyev ” ( ZISP) ; 1 ♂. “25/6 Sn”, marked with red labels “ Syntypus Urophora dzieduszyckii Frfld. des. V. Korneyev ” ( Museum of Natural History , Lviv: collection of Dzieduszycki) . Holotype ♀ Urophora syriaca : [ Syria:]: “ Dr F. Leuthner // Ladiaje // 6.1885”, “Type ♀ ” (red paper, Hendel handwriting), “ syriaca H. // det. F. Hendel reversal side: “ Euribia ”]”. “coll. Hcndel ”, “Type ♀ Euribia syriaca Marked by Hardy” ( NHMW). Holotype ♂ Euribia erichi-schmidti : Syria: “Nahr el Hous-saine, 5 km N Tartous, Syrien [5 km from Tartus, Nähr el Houssaine] 18. V. 1952, leg. Erich Schmidt ”, reversal side: “from Echinops ” ( BMNH).

Non-type. Ukraine: Ternopil: [Synkiv (?)]: “Coll. Egger // Austria”, 1 ♀, “aprica det. Egger”, “ Euribia dzieduszyckii Frfld. det. Mayer 1953” ( NHMW); “Galizien Ende Juni”, “Babek”, 2 ♂ ( NHMW); “Halizia// (Nowicki) Mik”, 1 ♀ “Dzieduszyckii det Mik” ( SIZK) (obviously all from the same series as the lectotype); Ustechko, Dzhuryn River valley, on Echinops exaltatus flower head, 17.07.2016 (photo observation: Fig.); ibidem, dead in in spider web on Echinops exaltatus , 17.07.2016, 1 ♂ (S. & V. Korneyev) ( SIZK); Turylche to Hushtynka, 48.80° N, 26.21° E, 23.06.2019, 3 ♂, 2 ♀ (O. Vikyrchak, photo observations); idem, 26.07.2019, 1 ♀ (S. & V. Korneyev, O. Vikyrchak, photo observations), 1 ♂ (dead dry fly on a leaf) ( V. Korneyev) ( SIZK).

Israel: [Mt.] Meiron , 15.06.1971, 5 ♂, 5 ♀ (J. Kugler) Mt. Hermon, 1600 m. 21– 22.06.1971, 5 ♂, 5 ♀ (J. Kugler); idem, ( NHMW); Mount Hermon   GoogleMaps , 33.32°N 35.77°E, 29.05.2000, 10 ♂, 2 ♀ (Kameneva & V. Korneyev) ( SIZK); Carmel ridge, Har ( Mt. ) Carmel, Isafiye, 32°43’49.1’’N, 35°03’02-1’’E, 515m, 27.05.2012, on Echinops sp. , 1 spm. (J. Smit & Freidberg leg.) ( RMNH); Har   GoogleMaps (Mt.) Hermon, 33°17’40.8’’N, 35°45’33.9’’E, 1500m, 24.05.2012, 2 spm. Har   GoogleMaps ( Mt.   GoogleMaps ) Hermon, Newe Ativ, 33°15’49.5’’N, 35°44’27.9’’E, 996m, 25.05.2012, 4 spm., Newe Ativ   GoogleMaps , 33°15’49.5’’N, 35°44’27.9’’E, 996m, on Echinops sp. , 25.05.2012, 2 spm. (J. Smit & Freidberg leg.); Upper Galilee   GoogleMaps , Har   GoogleMaps (Mt.) Meron, 32°59’45.4’’N, 35°24’33.2’’E, 1096m, 25.05.2012, 12 spm. (J. Smit & Freidberg leg.) ( RMNH).

Remarks. The species has been redescribed in detail from Israel as “ Urophora syriaca ” (Freidberg & Kugler, 1989) , but comparison of morphological characters shows no essential characters distinguishing them from the Ukrainian type and non-type specimens. The Near East populations have been considered therefore to be conspecific with the type series of U. dzieduszyckii ( Korneyev, 1996) , and the names synonymized; however, no comparison of the barcoding DNA sequences has been done, and there is still a chance that they actually represent cryptic allospecies or subspecies.

The Ukrainian and Near East populations are believed to be widely disjunct in Romania, Balkan Peninsula and Asia Minor, but there were no special studies aiming to discover small local populations of Echinops exaltatus Schrad. or similar species in these regions.

More recently, Yaran & Kütük (2014) described another nominal species, Urophora turkiyensis from South-Eastern Turkey. It shows no differences from Urophora dzieduszyckii , despite the authors suggested that it has “black 1st flagellomere of antenna rather than yellow” [in Urophora dzieduszyckii ]. It looks like they compared it with superficially similar U. quadrifasciata (Meigen, 1826) insted of U. dzieduszyckii . One of us (VAK) has pointed on this in the review of the manuscript, but it had not been taken into consideration. We therefore consider them to be conspecific with the other Near East specimens we examined and synonymize the names Urophora dzieduszyckii and U. turkiyensis .

Conservation status. In Ukraine, U. dzieduszyckii is included in the “Red Data Book of Ukraine ” as a “rare or possibly extinct species” ( Korneyev, 2009). It has not been rediscovered in its strict type locality, Synkiv, and we failed to find even its host plant there ( Figs 2–4).

The first redicovery of it, 150 years after its original find, was in July 2016, 33 km NWW of the type locality. We there found that this species is associated with the plant Echinops exaltatus ( Asteraceae ), another protected species in Ukraine ( Figs 5–8). The flies are believed to form soft, non-lignified galls in the flower heads, similar to U. quadrifasciata , U. pontica (Hering, 1937) and U. notata (Belanovsky, 1937) , the latter two species also feeding in Echinops spp. (V. Korneyev, unpublished data). In Israel, U. dzieduszyckii was reared from the flower heads of Echinops viscosus DC.

In Ternopil Region of Ukraine, E. exaltatus is known from a few localities, where it is represented by small isolated stands of 5–50 plants each. Of them, the stand near Ustechko, where U. dzieduszyckii was found in 2016, now is entirely destroyed, but the fly was recently found in the valley of Zbruch between Turylche and Hushtynka.

We have observed three additional localities (of the 7–8 known in Ukraine) with stands of E. exaltatus , but no flies have been found yet.

Echinops exaltatus prefers moderately humid, often partly shaded places, usually in the valleys of small rivers, at the margin of shrubs and woods, and does not occur in dry and open stands (differing from other local species of Echinops ). In Ukraine, U. dzieduszyckii has never been found on any other species of the genus Echinops during a more than 40-years long study of tephritids (V. Korneyev, personal observations).

In Israel, E. viscosus prefers similar conditions in the mountain areas, but U. dzieduszyckii is very common there, as well as other tephritid species associated with Echinops , but never occurring to the North of the Mediterranean zone.

Additional field studies with special targeting to find new populations of Echinops exaltatus and observations on the flies on their flower heads in a proper time of mass emergence of flies (June 15 to July 20), in order to discover new populations of this rare fly, not only in the southern part of Ternopil Region, but also in the bordering parts of Bukovyna (Chernivtsi Region), Moldova and Romania, are necessary to evaluate the actual population size in Europe and to include it in the European list of endangered species.