Glossosomatinae, which he separated as a family. Ross (1956) published a 

 large work on the 3 families Rhyacophilidae, Glossosomatidae and Philopo- 

 tamidae, which occur mainly in mountainous regions. He included in the 

 subfamily Rhyacophilinae the genera Rhyacophila Pict. and Himalo- 

 psyche Banks.* After establishing synonyms, he left in the subfamily 

 (until 1956) 312 species, 288 of them in Rhyacophila and 24 in Himalo - 

 psyche (Ross, 1956:116—123); he listed 159 species for Glossosomatidae 

 (except the Protoptilinae).** Lepneva (1956) described another genus of 

 Rhyacophilinae (based on the larva): Philocrena Lepn. with one species 

 (Ph. trialetica Lepn., from the Caucasus). 

 142 Ross based his revision of the genus Rhyacophila on the morphology 

 of the male genitalia; he divided the species of the genus in 9 branches; 

 each branch was divided into several species groups. He described the 

 phylogenetic relationships and origin of the branches and the species groups 

 in a dendrogram (Ross, 1956:76, cart 16); he listed the groups of each 

 branch and the species of which they consist on pp. 107 — 116. 



The number of species of Rhyacophila with described larvae is much 

 smaller than the number of species of this genus throughout the world; it is, 

 therefore, impossible to confirm Ross's classification as regards the 

 morphology of the larvae. However, in some groups in which the larvae of 

 one or several species are known, it is possible to compare the relationships 

 established on the basis of the adults with those in the larvae. 



We take for comparison the following groups (Ross, 1956:11 6— 123):t 

 from the 1st branch of Ross, the groups "l ob if e r a," to r va" and "gla- 

 berrima"; from the 2nd branch, the group "t r i s t i s"; from branch 3, 

 the groups "c u r vat a" and "acropedes"; from branch 4, the groups 

 "fuscula" and "vulgaris"; from branch 6, the groups "invaria," 

 "glareosa," "carolina," "philopotamoides" and "scissa"; from 

 branch 7, the group "s ib i r i c a"; from branch 9, the groups "retracta," 

 "naviculata" and "nigrocephala"; we take the species Rh.brevi- 

 cephala, Rh. shikotsuensis, Rh. impar, Rh. yamanakensis 

 and Rh. hokkaidensis, which were not included in the 9 branches. 



We shall examine the groups according to the degree of complexity 

 of the organization of the larvae of the species, and not according to the order 

 of Ross. We begin with species with the most primitive larvae (group 

 Hyporhyacophila Dohler) and end with species the larvae of which show 

 the highest level of organization (group Rhyacophila s. str. Dohler). 



Branch 1 of Ross includes 8 groups distributed in the east and west of 

 North America, South Asia and southern Europe. The larvae of the 3 North 

 American groups "lo b i fe r a, " "torva" and "glaberrima" (of the 

 species Rh. lobifera, Rh. torva and Rh. glaberrima) belong to the 

 most primitive type, to the group Hyporhyacophila. The larvae of 

 Hyporhyacophila lack thoracic and abdominal gills; they have a simple, 

 little differentiated, primary chaetotaxy and simple anal legs which are 

 without a distal, sword- shaped process of sclerite "b"; according to the form 

 of the body, the foregoing characters and other characters the larvae of the 

 group Hyporhyacophila closely resemble the 1st- stage larva (the 



* The species fie tcheri Kimm., which was separated by Kimmins as the genus Trichophila, was 



placed by Ross in a group of the genus Rhyacophila. 

 ** In the first volume of the "Trichopterorum Catalogus" Fischer listed 218 species for the Rhyacophilinae 



(until 1938), with 31 for the Hydrobiosinae and 113 for the Glossosomatinae (Glossosomatidae of Ross) 



(Fischer, 1960:12-163). 

 t The names of the groups of the genus Rhyacophila in Ross's scheme are listed in quotation marks. 



133 



