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UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM BULLETIN 224 



Genus Damalina Doleschall 



Figures 23, 424, 820, 842, 851, 1636, 1645, 2004, 2012 



Damalina Doleschall, Natuurkund. Tijdsehr. Nederlaudsch- 

 Indie, ser. 4, vol. 17, p. 90, 1858. Type of genus : Damalina 

 laticeps Doleschall, 1858, by monotypy. 



Small flies characterized by the relatively long, third 

 antennal segment much longer than broad, with an 

 apical style which is a little shorter than the third seg- 

 ment itself ; this character at once distinguishes it from 

 Damalis Fabricius. There are 5 normal, posterior cells ; 

 this character separates it from Trigonomima Ender- 

 lein in which there are only 4 such cells present, 1 being 

 completely eliminated. Osten Sacken (1882) com- 

 mented on the genus at some length. In the material I 

 have studied, there is always a tiny, additional, dorsally 

 placed bristle, much shorter than the ventrally placed 

 apical element in both Damalina and Trigonomima. It 

 should be added that in Trigonomima the thorax is 

 shortened and the mesonotum rises into an exaggerated 

 hump. Osten Sacken noted the close similarity between 

 the two, but had only one individual of a species with 

 only 4 posterior cells, from which one wing was already 

 missing. I have seen several species from each genus 

 and have examined the type of Holcocephala hirtipes 

 de Meijere, which falls in Damalina. 



Pritchard (1938) commented on Holcocephala hir- 

 tipes de Meijere in his revision of North and Central 

 American Holcocephala Jaennicke, suggesting that a 

 new genus should be formed for it. As I have com- 

 pared the type of H. hirtipes, lent me by the Amster- 

 dam Museum, with cotypes of both of Enderlein's spe- 

 cies of Trigonomima, and with other species of both 

 genera, I am unable to find any satisfactory basis for 

 separation. All these species have the double bristle 

 at the end of the third antennal segment, the lower one 

 longer, of variable length and strength. While the 

 bristle is curved or hooked in H. hirtipes, without more 

 material I regard this as insufficient basis for a new 

 genus, as it seems otherwise to be a typical species of 

 Damalina. The anal cell varies widely in different 

 species. Length 5 to 9 mm., including antenna. 



Head, lateral aspect : The face retreats below and has 

 on each side a deep, wide depression which leaves a 

 large V-shaped space between the eyes and cheeks. 

 Whole face pubescent, steeply convex laterally on the 

 lower portion and with 2 rows of 2 or more pairs of 

 bristles and 3 additional bristles above these, making 

 3 rows altogether. Proboscis from the dorsal aspect 

 rather strongly swollen towards the base. The antenna 

 is attached just above the middle of the head. The first 

 two segments are short and the third segment elongate, 

 compressed, and with long and short bristles near the 

 apex. 



Head, anterior aspect: The head width is twice the 

 height. The face below antemia is nearly half the 

 width of the head and divergent below. The vertex is 

 slightly wider than the upper face. 



Thorax: The mesonotum is shining, without pollen 

 except medially and below the humeri and faintly in 

 front of the scutelhun on the scutellar disc and also 

 along the lateral margin. Pleuron densely, minutely 

 pubescent. Pile of mesonotum abundant, long, fine, 

 erect and bristly; dorsocentral and acrostical bristles 

 or hairs are not differentiated, although posteriorly the 

 pile becomes abundant and longer. The following 

 very weak, lateral bristles or bristly hairs are present : 

 2 notopleural, 3 or 4 supraalar; on the scutellum only 

 across the disc and not on the margin are 3 rows of 

 long, slender bristles or bristly hairs, some 12 in num- 

 ber, and nearer the base there are 5 or 6 other shorter, 

 more slender, bristly hairs. Scutellum convex and 

 rather thick. Mesopleuron and sternopleuron with 

 long, abundant, stiff pile; the extraordinarily convex 

 and protuberant metanotum is rather thickly covered 

 with long, slender bristles or bristly hairs. 



Legs : All the femora are stout and somewhat swol- 

 len, especially the hind femur, which gradually in- 

 creases in thickness from the base to the outer fourth. 

 Hind tibia unusually stout and slightly arcuate, its 

 basitarsus as long as the next 3 segments and greatly 

 swollen. All the femora and their tibiae with dense, 

 dorsal and ventral lateral and medial brushes of long, 

 stiff, bristly pile. The second, third, and fourth tarsal 

 segments of all of the tarsi with a dense, ventral brush 

 of appressed setae, for the most part beginning at a 

 distance from and conspicuously removed from the 

 bases of the segments; basitarsal pile in part glandular. 



Wings : The marginal cell, all the posterior cells, and 

 the anal cell widely open. Five posterior cells present, 

 all open. Width of wing normal and uniformly tinged 

 with brown ; the ambient vein complete. 



Abdomen: In the abdomen the tergites are com- 

 pletely chitinized and no evidence of medial membrane. 

 Eight tergites present in both sexes, the eighth a little 

 longer than the seventh, conical, narrowed slightly and 

 also considerably narrower than the seventh tergite. 

 The abdomen grows wider at end of third segment and 

 is rather strongly narrowed beyond. At the end of 

 third segment it is at least as wide as the mesonotum. 

 Male terminalia variable. In one species the eighth 

 tergite is large, and forms a longitudinally laterally 

 convex, hoodlike, polished sclerite, beneath which at 

 the apex the widely separated arms of the divided 

 epandrium form an elongate forceps, curved to and 

 crossing shortly at the midline and passing above the 

 long proctiger, which lies beneath it and extends 

 shortly beyond it; in this form, the wide, intermediate 

 space between the epandrial arms is membranous, the 

 gonopod is well developed, the hypandrium moderately 

 long and the penis guides exaggerated, long, obliquely 

 protruding below. In another species the eighth ter- 

 gite is smaller, thinner, flatter, and the proctiger con- 

 stitutes a broad, polished, distal, laterally convex plate 

 with the hairy apex very short; here the arms of the 

 forceps are long, but do not turn inward or cross ; the 

 base of epandrium is approximated toward the middle 

 as rectangular projections still separated. Gonopod 



