Thrips safrus Mound & Masumoto, 2005

Thrips safrus Mound & Masumoto View in CoL

Thrips safrus Mound & Masumoto, 2005: 45 View in CoL View Cited Treatment

Diagnosis: Body and legs white, last antennal segments light brown, remaining segments pale; forewings pale. Antennae 7-segmented; ocellar setae III arise just within anterolateral margins of ocellar triangle close to first ocellus, postocular setae arranged in straight row, subequal in size. Pronotum with transverse striae, 4–5 posteromarginal setae, outer postero-angular seta shorter than inner seta. Metanotum irregularly reticulate medially, median setae well behind anterior margin, campaniform sensilla present. Forewing first vein usually with 3 setae on distal half; clavus with terminal seta longer than subterminal seta. Abdominal tergite II with 3 lateral setae; abdominal tergite VIII with posteromarginal comb represented by a few teeth laterally; sternite II with 1 or 2 discal setae, III–VII with 15–25 discal setae in an irregular transverse row; pleurotergites with no discal setae.

Specimen studied: INDIA: Punjab , Ludihana, 1 female, 19.iv.1967, Lantana flowers, coll. JSB (Reg. No. 18791/H17) .

Comments: Described originally from various sites in northern Australia, with one female from New Caledonia, this species has otherwise been found established only on the Hawaiian Islands ( Mound et al. 2017). The single female listed above remained unidentified in the collections of J.S. Bhatti, but using the key to species of Thrips from Indian subregion ( Bhatti 1980) it reached to T. longiceps . However, from that species it differs in the colour of the body, position of ocellar setae III, and number of antennal segments. Identified here as T. safrus based on the Mound and Masumoto key, this female represents a particularly unusual record of a species that is presumably non-endemic.