Xylocopa perforator Smith, 1862

71. Xylocopa perforator Smith, 1862 View in CoL

Figs 69–70

Xylocopa perforator Smith, 1862: 61–62 View in CoL , ♀ ♂.

Type material examined

Lectotype

INDONESIA • ♀; Tim. [ Timor, probably Kupang , East Nusa Tenggara]; [most likely 13–27 May 1859]; OUMNH, ENT-HYME2825 ( lectotype designated by Lieftinck 1956b).

Paralectotypes

INDONESIA • 1 ♂; Tim. [ Timor, probably Kupang , East Nusa Tenggara]; [most likely 13–27 May 1859]; OUMNH • 1 ♂; Tim. [ Timor, probably Kupang , East Nusa Tenggara]; [most likely 13–27 May 1859]; NHMUK, Type 17b, 151 (examined by photograph) .

Type locality

Nominally Ternate, but most likely Timor ( Lieftinck 1956b).

Notes

Lieftinck (1955: 31–32) published on X. perforator , giving a terra typica of Ternate (under the name X. perforator Smith, 1861 ) and a distribution spanning Sumatra, Java, Borneo, the Lesser Sunda islands, and Batjan [= Bacan], the latter based on a single female specimen. He wrote:

“ X. perforator was originally described from Ternate (North Moluccas), but it has apparently either been neglected by entomologists on account of its large size and supposed abundant, or it is very scarce in these eastern islands, for recent expeditions to Halmahera, Ternate, Batjan, and Obi yielded no further specimens. The presence in the Leiden Museum of a female from Batjan (Van der Weele collection), however, is significant and of great interest”.

Lieftinck (1956b: 73) then published further on the species:

“Type material studied. — 1 ♀, 1 ♂, both carrying round labels indicated “Tim” [= Timor!] and, in addition, ♀ with blue, ♂ with white labels “ Xylocopa perforator Smith ” in F. Smith’s handwriting (type collection, OUM). 1 ♂, with round label “Tim”, in the type collection, No. 17 B. 51 ( BM). — The pair in the Oxford Museum should be considered to be the types of this species, and since Smith described the ♀ first, I have selected the ♀ in that collection as the lectotype of perforator F. Smith , the ♂ in the Oxford and British Museums representing Smith’s cotypes.

In a previous paper (loc. cit.) I have already expressed doubt as to the correctness of the interpretation of the locality originally given for perforator , since no specimens had ever been taken since on the Moluccan islands. A recent examination of the three specimens present in the Oxford University and British Museum collections has proved that all carry a written label with “Tim”, which obviously is an abbreviation of Timor, on which island the species has repeatedly been collected in more recent times as well. The original locality thus is Timor, not Ternate ”.

Baker (1993: 224) disagreed with Lieftinck’s treatment, quoting some of the text reproduced above and adding:

“All this deliberation and speculation, and the resultant false lectotype designation, could have been avoided if Lieftinck had (1) realized that the Timor specimens were those recorded in Smith’s 1863 paper, and (2) noticed that Smith’s ♀ syntype of perforator from Ternate had been left behind in Saunders’ collection, standing over Smith’s drawer-label ‘ perforator Ternate. Sm.’, when the Timor specimens were removed to the type collection. Further, even if he was not aware of the Timor record in Smith’s 1863 paper, Lieftinck should have realized, particularly since he dated Smith’s Ceram, Celebes, Ternate, Gilolo paper to 1861, that any Timor specimens were hardly likely to have been before Smith when the latter paper was drafted’; and might have wondered why, if Smith had had three specimens all clearly labelled ‘Tim’ before him, he should have given the locality as Ternate.

As to the identities of the two species here concerned, that from Ternate, which must be Smith’s perforator ”.

We disagree with Baker’s treatment for two reasons. The first is that we have been unable to retrieve any additional X. perforator specimens in the main OUMNH collection, specifically searching in the drawers that contain the W.W. Saunders collection. It is therefore difficult to judge what they are or may have been. The more important reason is that Smith (1862) clearly described the species in the female and male sexes; given that Baker claims that only a single female from Ternate was left behind in the Saunders collection, then how could Smith have also described the male? The male specimen labelled as coming from Timor clearly matches Smith’s description in “the eyes very large, nearly touching on the vertex” ( Fig. 70B), “the clypeus triangular, the anterior margin fringed with short pale pubescence” ( Fig. 70C), and “the anterior tarsi dilated, fringed with black pubescence behind; beneath it is nearly white” ( Fig. 70D–E).

This male specimen or the specimen in the NHMUK (also a male) must be syntypic (or at least, one of them must be syntypic) because Smith must have examined them (or it) in order to write the description of the male sex. Given the known existence of three specimens all labelled as coming from Timor, the necessity of at least one of the male specimens being part of the original type series, and the subsequent study of the geographical distribution of this species ( Lieftinck 1955, 1956b), we consider it most likely that Smith simply gave the wrong island in his original description, both Ternate and Timor beginning with the same letter.

In terms of the collecting period, Baker is correct to imply in his writing that Wallace visited Timor in 1861, as Wallace departed Ternate on 2 Jan. 1861, arriving in Dili in Timor-Leste on 7 Jan. 1861 and staying there until 25 Apr. 1861 ( Wallace 1869). Given that the bee section (pages 49–66) of Smith (1862) was not published until 1 Mar. 1862 (and pages 36–48 were published on 1 Nov. 1861) it is not impossible that Smith examined these specimens from Dili when writing the description of X. perforator , but it is unlikely given the observed lag seen for the collection and description dates for other species. A much more likely explanation is that Wallace previously visited Timor between 25–26 Nov. 1857 en route from Makassar to Ambon Island ( 19–30 Nov. 1857), spending a day each in Kupang and Dili, and again between 13–27 May 1859 at Kupang after departing Ternate on 1 May 1859 ( Wallace 1869).

Baker (2001: 280) gave the same collecting dates, writing that:

“Wallace’s Timor insects were included in his ‘ Ternate &c and Menado’ consignment of October 1859 (notebook, p. [32]). They were not listed separately but counted in with the Ternate insects, the totals being private 900, sale ‘abt. 2000’. British Museum: the BM appears to have purchased no Timor insects from this consignment, unless they became mixed with the Menado material purchased in September and October 1860 (Accession Numbers 60.76, 60.90). The only direct reference in the Accessions Register to Timor material does not appear until August 1862 and even that entry is doubtful, having been annotated ‘should be Batchian v. Koltes Novitates’. W.W. Saunders: Saunders’ Timor Hymenoptera , jointly with others from Mysol, Ceram, Waigiou and Bouru, were treated by Smith (1863, read 15 January 1863). Pinned specimens were labelled ‘Tim.’.”.

We believe that it is much more likely that Smith would have examined some of these Timor specimens from May 1859 mixed in with specimens from Ternate. Given the collection dates of other specimens published in Smith (1862), we consider 13–27 May 1859 the most likely collecting dates for X. perforator and Kupang ( Indonesia, East Nusa Tenggara) to be the most likely terra typica. We have therefore labelled the specimen indicated by Lieftinck (1956b) as the lectotype ( Fig. 69), as his comments allow it to be unambiguously recognised within the OUMNH collection ( ICZN 1999 Article 74), and the male is labelled as paralectotype ( Fig. 70).

Current status

Xylocopa ( Platynopoda) perforator Smith, 1862 .

Distribution

Indonesia ( Sumatra, Java, Borneo, Lesser Sunda Islands) and Timor-Leste ( Maa 1939; Lieftinck 1955, 1956b). Ascher & Pickering (2024) also gives locations in Malaysia (Peninsula, Borneo).

Species described by Smith (1863) from the islands of Buru, Misool, Seram, Timor, and Waigeo, and also Manokwari (Doberai Peninsula, New Guinea)