356 MANTIDAE AND PHASMIDAE OF PANAMA 



General coloration dark brown, the velvety areas proximad on each side 

 of the sixth tergite blackish brown. 



Length of body, 53; length of auriform lobe of head, 1.9; length of pronotum, 

 4; length of mesonotum, 13; width of mesonotum, 5; length of metanotum 

 (including median segment), 6; length of cephalic femur, 10.8; length of ceph- 

 alic tibia, 10.3; length of caudal femur, 12.7; length of caudal tibia, 12; 

 length of operculum, 10.7 mm. 



The type of this soml^er, twig-like phasmid is unique. 



Libethra panamae new species (Plate XIV, figure 9; XV, figures 3 and 4 ) 



This insect is nearest L. venezuelica Brunner, differing in the 

 female in the cephalic femora being dilated dorsad and in the 

 specialization of the second and sixth tergites; in the male in 

 the apex of the abdomen being apparently^^ not as strongly 

 inflated. 



We believe it to be extremely probable that the male, recorded 

 by Grifhni as Cmdonia molita ( West wood) j^'* from Lake Pita, 

 Darien, Panama, represents the present species. The male of 

 true molita may l)e distinguished by the much smoother surface, 

 cerci which are more slender distad, eight tergite without a 

 projection of the latero-caudal angles ventrad and longer and 

 more specialized eighth sternite. . 



Type. — cf ; Paraiso, Canal Zone, Panama. January 23, 1911. 

 (E. A. Schwarz.) [United States National Museum.] 



Size medium, form slender, as is usual in this sex of s]:)ecies of Libethra. 

 Head as long as pronotum, occiput slightly swollen caudad, with scattered 

 granules and a fine medio-longitudinal line, a slightly larger granule on each 

 side caudad on the swollen area. Pronotum with very weak scattered granules 

 and a fine medio-longitudinal line, the transverse sulcus distinct, on each 

 side sending as strong a sulcus to the cephalic margin, paralleling the lateral 

 margins. Mesonotum with weak scattered granules in cephalic two-thirds, 

 the medio-longitudinal line subcarinulate and continued on metanotum, which 

 is otherwise smooth. Tergites showing traces of four fine longitudinal carinae, 

 these becoming distinct on caudal portion of fifth and all of sixth tergites, the 

 three succeeding tergites strongly medio-longitudinally carinate, the seventh 

 expanding with sides showing additional carinae, the eighth strangulate, the 

 ninth cucullate, shghtly broader than long, on each side with surface dorso- 



•■'^ Insektcnfamilie der Phasmiden, j). 307, (1!)07). The descri})tion is, as 

 usual in that work, thorough!}' unsatisfactory, omitting any definite genitalic 

 diagnosis and other featunss by which the species is i)robably l)est distinguished. 

 As a result we believe that panamae actually shows decidedly more striking 

 features of difference than we can give without material for comparison. 



'•^^ Boll. Mus. Zool. Anat. Comp. Univ. Torino, xi, no. 23(), p. 9, (1890). 



