EDMUND H. GIBSON 187 



THE GENUS GARGAPHIA STAL 



(TINGIDAE ; HETEROPTERA i 



BY EDMUND H. GIBSON 



Utdled States Bureau of Entomology 



This paper is an attempt to bring together and up to date the 

 taxonomic knowledge of this very interesting and characteristic 

 genus. It is drawn up along the lines of the author's recent 

 work on the genus Corythucha Stal, and is the third in a series of 

 contributions to the knowledge of the family Tingidae, which 

 family the writer hopes to monograph at some future date. 



Gargaphia Stal embraces at the present time twenty-five 

 species, five of which are herein described as new. The genus is 

 limited in its distribution to North, Central and South America, 

 and includes several species which are of economic importance 

 as plant feeders. 



Because of the fact that material, including types, of some of 

 the South American forms has not been available for study, it has 

 been impossible for the writer to redescribe them and hence to 

 treat those species separately. However the lack of this degree 

 of completeness is not sufficient to warrant the withholding of 

 the detailed treatment of the remaining species. It is believed 

 that until certain types in European museums can be studied 

 this paper is as complete as possible. 



The characters used in separating the species are quite a dif- 

 ferent set than are used in the genus Corythucha. The pronotal 

 hood in Gargaphia is so much reduced that comparative measure- 

 ments would hardly be reliable. The size and shape of the 

 lateral margins of the pronotum, and the number of rows of 

 areoles in the costal and subcostal areas of the elytra, are the 

 most stable characters for the determination of species. The 

 character of the head spines should also be taken into account. 



St&l described Gargaphia as a subgenus of Monanthia in 1862, 

 and then, in 1873, he gave it generic rank. His pairicia is the 

 logotype of the genus. 



TRANS. AM. ENT. SOC, XLV. 



