


REVISIONARY CLASSIFICATION OF RUTILIINI 109 
reduced palpi and enlarged upper calypter already referred to also provide obvious 
differential characters from these genera. 
The feature of enlarged upper calypter is most noteworthy, as enlargement of the 
upper calypter seems to occur nowhere else in the Tachinidae. Several unrelated 
Tachinids have the /ower calypter enlarged, even to such an enormous extent in the 
male that the whole abdomen is covered by them, but the lower calypter is never 
enlarged in Rutiliini whereas the upper one is in Prodiaphania. 
The species of Prodiaphania are extraordinarily uniform in their externals, al- 
though there are some minor differences in the leg chaetotaxy which can be used to 
differentiate certain species or groups of species in a key. But, luckily for the 
taxonomist, the male genitalia in Prodiaphania are more diverse and provide more 
uniquely distinctive characters for distinguishing species than in any other genus of 
Rutiliini, and both Malloch (1936) and Paramonov (1968) have made use of (and 
figured) the male genitalia of several species. Some of the developments in the 
genitalia of male Prodiaphania are rather bizarre (by the standards of Tachinidae) 
and include the enlargement of the surstyli into enormous flattened elliptical plates 
set in the transverse plane (in georgei), the development of a very large forwardly 
projecting process at the base of the surstylus (as in furcata) and the development of 
exceptionally dense tufts of long hair on the bases of the surstyli (as in festacea). 
Sometimes the male genital characters are very distinctive even when the external 
features show no evident reliable differences, and consequently dependable keys 
to the species need to be based mainly on the male genitalia. Females rarely show 
any reliable differences and it is difficult or well-nigh impossible to associate wild 
caught females with males. 
Paramonov (1968) published a key to females as well as to males, and even 
described one species (walkeri) from a unique female holotype, but it seems to me 
that some of Paramonov’s associations of females with males are very uncertain 
and in my view it is impossible at present to identify females reliably and therefore 
impossible to provide a workable key to them. Even Paramonov’s key, on assumed 
associations of identity, seems very unsatisfactory, and walkeri (based only on the 
female) conflicts in the key characters with those cited in the description: in walkeri 
_ description (p. 400) the palpi are ‘about as long as the third antennal segment’ 
and the ‘calypters of about same size’, whereas the species is run out in the key 
_ (p. 387) by the couplets reading ‘Upper calypter distinctly shorter than lower’ and 
_ ‘Palpi half as long as third antennal segment’. 
In the present work it has been concluded that Paramonov’s keys to Prodiaphania 
_ are not very satisfactory, and that only a key to males is practicable at this stage. 
I have therefore attempted to give here a revised key to males, based upon male 
genitalia together with the few external features that seem reliable, and have given 
_ figures of the male genitalia for as many species as I can (not all the types have been 
to hand during this work). Before giving this key, and the list of included species, 
it is necessary to allude to some of the nominal species which Paramonov (1968) 
included in Prodiaphania. 
Paramonov (1968 : 391) assumed that ruficornis Macquart belonged in the genus, 
_ but this is incorrect; the male holotype of ruficornis has been examined and found to 
