GALERUCINE BEETLES BLAKE 79 



El Cermino, J. Zetek; Pedro Miguel, N. L. H. Krauss; Volcdn de Chiri- 

 qul, 2500-4000 ft., Champion. 



Remarks: In 1878 Jacoby described as Diabrotica sexplagiaia a 

 beetle whose habitat he gave as Peru and Panama. In 1887 he stated 

 that the Peruvian specimens were a different species from the Panama 

 ones and used the name sexplagiaia for the Panama species. Gahan in 

 1891 called attention to the fact that the claws of D. sexplagiaia were 

 appendiculate and referred the species to the genus Neobroiica. This 

 emendation Jacoby (1892) accepted in his Supplement to the Biologia. 

 Meanwhile, Baly had described as D, bimttaticollis a similar form 

 from Magdalena River, Colombia, which Jacoby (1892) referred 

 to synonymy under his Panama species. In the material examined 

 from Panama that I have tried to match with Jacoby's description of 

 sexplagiaia, I have found four distinct species. There are many of 

 Jacoby's specimens in the Bowditch collection of the Museum of 

 Comparative Zoology, and Mr. G. E. Bryant has kindly sent me other 

 material from the British Museum, but in all this I have not found 

 specimens that Jacoby originally had from Panama for his first descrip- 

 tion. In the Bowditch collection are three specimens from Volc^n de 

 Chiriqui, Panama, collected later by Champion, and the specimens 

 from the British Museum are of this same series collected by Cham- 

 pion. Possibly Jacoby had earlier specimens collected by Salvin, 

 But these Champion specimens match Jacoby's description. However, 

 the two figures given later for this species in the Biologia Centrali- 

 Americana Supplement are of beetles collected elsewhere, the first from 

 Belize, British Honduras, with an entirely pale pronotum (in the 

 original description the pronotum is given as having a lateral piceous 

 vitta on each side extending from the anterior margin nearly to the 

 basal margin), and the second from Tapachula, Chiapas, Mexico, 

 which Mr. Bryant has sent me, with sutural and lateral elytral vittae, 

 distinctly different from his description of the three large yellow spots 

 on each elytron. It seems quite evident that Jacoby was confused by 

 the wealth of his material, all of which he tried to include in his later 

 account of sexplagiaia in the Biologia. In reality there are a number 

 of closely related species having the 6-spotted elytra, but differing in 

 many other less obvious ways. These range from Mexico to Bolivia 

 and Brazil. 



In my interpretation of sexplagiaium I am considering these speci- 

 men from the Volc^n de Chiriqui as typical as they correspond with 

 Jacoby's original description. In Central America this species seems 

 not to occur north of Panama, In South America, however, is found 

 a beetle very similar to the Panama species in markings. Baly (1886a) 

 described specimens from Magdelena River, Colombia, as Diabrotica 

 biviiiaticollis. Mr. Bryant has sent me a paratype of Baly's species 



