Thaumamannia Drake & Davis, 1960

Thaumamannia Drake & Davis, 1960 View in CoL

Diagnosis: Characterized by the inclined head, the presence of explanate paranota and costal area, the relatively small scutellum, conspicuously concave hemelytra, and the laterally projected scent gland, strongly Y-shaped with enlarged tips in both anterior and posterior branches of the peritreme.

Redescription: Head: Declined, usually with most of its length hidden in dorsal view, heavily pubescent; clypeus usually in different colour than head; pedicel subequal to basiflagellomere, both smaller than distiflagellomere and usually twice as big as scape; eyes reduced with none or few ommatidia, triangular in shape; rostrum reaching at least the third abdominal segment. Thorax: Posterior lobe slightly raised; coarsely punctate, mostly on collar and posterior lobe, collar indistinct; anterior border usually concave; posterior usually straight; paranota explanate, smooth, usually projected forwards. Hemelytra: Entirely coriaceous and coleopteroid, ovate, pubescent; remarkably convex, no clavus nor membrane distinct; carina-like vein extending variably from the anterior border, deeply punctate; costal area explanate, with one inner row of punctations only; hypocosta broad and coarsely punctate. Scent gland: Anterior branch gradually projected laterally, tip much more projected than base; varying in height, conspicuously inclined frontwards; tip tilted horizontally, large; posterior branch usually curved, with enlarged tip. Legs: Femora only slightly swollen; tarsi two segment, second segment at least five-times longer.

Type species: Thaumamannia manni Drake & Davis, 1960 .

Distribution: Brazil, Bolivia and Suriname ( Fig. 18D View Figure 18 ).

Discussion: The genus was described by Drake & Davis (1960) and the second species, T. vanderdrifti Van Doesburg (1977) was described 17 years later. From these two species, only T. manni was collected associated with ants ( Drake & Davis, 1960). The broadly ovate body, which was considered a strong diagnostic feature of the genus, is now challenged with the description of a new species herein described. However, the conspicuously Y-shaped scent gland remains as an important diagnostic character for the genus, currently composed by a total of four species, including the two species described below. Thaumamannia vanderdrifti was the first Vianaidinae reported from Brazil ( Guidoti et al., 2014) and now both T. insolita and T. urucuana are also reported from that country. Thaumamannia insolita and one specimen of T. urucuana had its locality data reported as lost and we only know the state where they came from (Pará State, Brazil). The only species with immature forms described is T. vanderdrifti , which had its fifth instar described and analysed in SEM ( Guidoti et al., 2014).