A Remarkable New Genus of Lygaeidae From Sumatra (Hemiptera: Heteroptera)

Many species ot Lygaeidae possess tore temora that are strongly incrassate and armed on the ventral surface with sharp spines. Many workers have assumed that these powerful legs were associated vith predatory habits and indeed as recently as I956 Miller illustrated species o Blissinae (Spalacocoris and Chelochirus) as examples ot legs modited or raptoral purposes. However, it has been evident tor a long time that this was at best an oversimplification and that very strongly incrassate and heavily spinous legs were known in such subamilies as the Pachygronthinae and Oxycareninae whose members so ar studied are entirely phytophagous, whereas in the predaceous Geocorinae the tore temora are slender and not at all adapted or seizing prey. The enlarged leg is best expressed in the great subfamily Rhyparochrominae where nearly all of the many hundreds of species possess enlarged and ventrally spined tore emora. Putshkov (I956) and Sweet (I96O) have shown that most, if not all, of the rhyparochromines are seed teeders. Thus the tunction ot these legs remains unknown. They do not appear to be used in mating’ behavior or in antennal cleaning, nor to any appreciable extent in carrying tood etc. Yet it seems unlikely that legs of this type would persist throughout hundreds of species in many different genera distributed in several different subfamilies and in all of the major zoogeographic regions vithout having an important unction. Solution of this problem should be a matter o considerable interest to those concerned with the question of correlation of torm and unction trom inferred evidence. Recently Sweet (in litt.) has noticed some remarkable threatening behavier, displayed intraspecifically by several species ot rhyparochromines in defense ot food, that involves the use ot the tore temora. This may offer a clue to an understanding of this interesting biological problem. Despite our lack of knowledge of the. tunction ot these tore legs we do know enough of their occurrence in the amily Lygaeidae to conclude that they are not ot random distribution. The presence ot incrassate tore emora is the predominant condition in the Rhyparochrominae, Pachygronthinae and Oxycareninae whereas they are *Manuscript received l.’ the editor December 20, 1961.