e. Bergroth.
Some Tipulid Synonymy.
Psyche 22:54-59, 1915.

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54 Psyche [April
date this specific name and it is, therefore, to be credited to him. As stated above, this name falls into synonymy under the earlier established name quercus.
Considerable damage was done by the above locust during the past season near New Lisbon, N. J. Concerning them and the damage they did Mr. H. B. Scammell writes as follows: ". . . they infested the oak woods near New Lisbon, N. J., to an alarming extent. Some of the tallest oaks were nearly defoliated , . . The area infested approximated two square miles." Macropterous individuals and nymphs of both sexes were received from the collector for determination but no brachypterous speci- mens were sent. However; it is quite likely that both long and short winged forms were concerned here as in the case of injuri- ous occurrence reported by Mr. Davis in 1912, Ent. News, Vol. XXIII, p. 2.
SOME TIPULID SYNONYMY.
BY E. BERGROTH,
Turtola, Finland.
The following notes are published as a sequel to those given by me in the Annals and Magazine of Natural History (8) XI, p. 578-584.
1. In the Canadian Entomologist 1913, p. 200-205, Alexander has described two Japanese species under the names Dicranomyia japonica and D. nebulosa. From the long subcosta and the struc- ture of the male forceps it is clear that these two species belong to the genus Limnobia. Moreover, in japonica, the radial cross-vein is considerably removed from the tip of Ri, a structure which, as pointed out by Osten-Sacken, never occurs in Dicranomyia. Ed- wards (in letter) agrees with me as to the systematic position of these species, and I think there can be little doubt that D. eiseni AL, too, is a Limnobia. D. gloriosa and lutzi, both described by Alexander, should in my opinion also be placed in Limnobia, at least until the forceps in the still unknown males proves to be of the Dicranomyia type. Alexander's conception of these two genera seems to be so different from that of Osten-Sacken and all Pu&e 2254-59 ( 1915). hup Ytpsychu einclub orgt22/22-OM html



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19151 Bergroth-Some Tipulid Synonymy 55
other authors that an explanation how he distinguishes them is much to be desired.
2. In the above mentioned paper in the Annals and Magazine of Natural History (p. 580) I said that the palpi in Aporosa are placed at the apex of the rostrum. Not having at hand the scarce work of Webb and Berthelot, where Macquart first described Aporosa, I relied on Enderlein's statement, but Edwards, who has seen the work, has informed me that the palpi are removed from the apex of the rostrum and that Enderlein apparently had mistaken the "labellse" in Macquart's figure for the palpi. Aporosa, therefore, is a synonym of Geranbmyia Hal., as stated by Osten-Sacken.
3. Edwards (in letter) shares my opinion (1. c., p. 581) that Liponeura Skuse (incorrectly written " Leiponeura") is a good genus, but he has called my attention to the fact that the name is preoccupied by Loew for another genus of Diptera Nematocera. I, therefore, propose the name Lipophleps for it. Edwards does not think that Lipophleps is allied to Atarba 0. S., as he has satis- fied himself that Atarba has spurred tibiae, a point of which Osten-Sacken was uncertain. If we attach the same importance as Osten-Sacken to the presence of tibial spurs, Atarba would be ex- ceedingly difficult to locate systematically, for it can under no circumstances be placed in the Cylindrotominse. Alexander has,
however, shown by several examples that this character has been overrated, and it is known that the generic characters taken from the tibial spurs in the order Trichoptera cannot be relied on. Al- though Alexander (PSYCHE, 1913, p. 41) correctly states that "the presence of a cell Ra is a tribal character, not generic as considered by Becker," he has in all his papers taken the view that this charac- ter is not even generic in the genus Gonomyia, and for this reason he regards Lipophleps as a subgenus of Gonornyia. I have previously given the reasons why I cannot agree with this point of view; still less can I agree with Alexander's opinion that species with a fun- damentally different structure of the male genitalia can be con- generic.
4. Edwards has informed me that the figure of the wing of his Thaumastoptera aldabrensis is incorrect in several respects, that the venation in fact is the same as in the genus Ptilostena Bergr., save that Rs is not turned upwards, and that the male propygium



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56 Psyche [April
of aldabrensis is almost quite identical with that of the type of Ptilostena. He therefore places aldabrensis without hesitation in Piilostena which he thinks was correctly placed near Gonomi/ia. The upturned R3 is only a specific character of Pt. recurvinervis Bergr.
5. Alexander has for some time placed Empeda as a subgenus of Erioptera. In this he differs widely from Schiner and Osten- Sacken who never even thought of the possibility of associating these two genera. I cannot help thinking that this innovation has very little to recommend it. In the paper where this new place was assigned to Empeda no reasons for the change were given, but later, speaking of Erioptera brevior Brun. (which is an Empeda), Alexander summarily says: "Empeda is merely an Erioptera in which the fusion of R2+3 is a little longer than usual." This fusion is, however, much longer in Empeda, so much in fact that, in opposition to Eriopiera,l the radial cross-vein joins Ra before its branching and that the cell Ra assumes a quite different shape.
And what of the other differences?
Sea is in Eriopteral
removed very far backwards from the tip of Sci, whereas it is placed close to its tip in Empeda; the middle legs in Erioptera are strikingly shorter than the two other pairs, which is not the case in Empeda; and so on. Osten-Sacken regarded Empeda as very closely related to Gonomyia, and it comes in fact at least as near to this genus as to Erioptera. In Erioptera he included several heter- ogenous elements, and to add Empeda to them is only to increase the confusion. "Cui tending to turn toward the apex of the wing" is given as a character of Erioptera in Alexander's key to the genera (Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus. 44, p. 492). This character fits some spe- cies of Empeda, but not all. If we unite Empeda with Erioptera and consider the fact that the length of Sc is rather variable in Empeda, and that the presence or absence of the cross-vein r is not perfectly constant as a generic character, we could quite as well unite Gonomyia with Erioptera and say: "Gonomyia is merely an Erioptera with the radial cross-vein wanting." The wing-vena- tion of Ptilostena aldabrensis Edw. must be very similar to that of Gonomyia blanda 0. S. (figured by Needham), and if the structure 1 Excluding E. imbuta Wied. which forms the very distinct monotypic genus Chilotrichia which comes nearer Empeda than any other Eriopterine genus and in no case can be referred to Er ioptera.




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19151 Bergroth-Some Tipulid Synonymy 57
of the propygium, as Alexander seems to think, is not of much im- portance as a generic character, we cannot separate Ptilostena from Gonomyia. In wing-venation and other characters Sacan- daga Al. seems to differ very little from Erioptera (in Alexander's sense), although the author assures that the resemblance is prob- ably merely accidental"
(whatever that may mean) and that
they are different "in general appearance." We would then have together there the whole series-Erioptera-Ilisia-Mesocyphona- Chilotrichia-Empeda-Sacandaga-Gonomyia - Ptilostena-Lipophleps- happily united in the same genus. But would this really clear up the study of the Eriopterinse? In my opinion it would decidedly be a step backward. It seems much better to follow Needham, Edwards, and many other dipterists in regarding Osten-Sacken's so-called subgenera of Erioptera as distinct genera. They are much more sharply separated from each other than the subgenera (or rather groups) of Limnophila are, and there is scarcely any species of Erioptera (in its broad sense) that could not easily be deter- mined as to its place in any of these genera. Of course certain species can in one or other respect approach towards some related genus, but this occurs in numerous genera in the whole animal kingdom without involving the necessity of giving up these genera. Lumping of genera is certainly in some cases better than the ex- cessive and often absurd splitting so characteristic of Theobald's and Enderlein's writings, but it should not be done without ade- quate grounds. It must be admitted, however, that the Eriop- terinse leave a more open field to personal opinions than most other groups of Tipulidse.
6. Acyphona 0. S. must take the older name Ilisia Rond. (1856).
Rondani after the description expressly states that Eriop- tera maculata Meig. is the type, and this was the only species he referred to the genus. That he many years later placed also two other species in it cannot, of course, invalidate its claim to recog- nition in its original comprehension. In describing two Japanese species of this genus Alexander says (Canad. Ent., 1913, p. 287) that maculata Meig. is the only described palearctic species of the genus, but the north-european obscuripes Zett . and areolata Siebke belong there, as shown by Wahlgren and L~ndstr~m. 7. Brunetti's book on the Indian Nematocera, which on a cur- sory examination makes such a good impression by the detailed



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58 Psyche [April
descriptions and excellent figures, reveals on closer scrutiny a great many partly almost incredible mistakes, the most curious of which concern what he calls Gnophomyia 0. S. and which is not a genus at all, but a mixture of heterogeneous forms belonging to several widely different divisions. It is unnecessary to publish my numerous notes on his Tipulidse, as they are almost identical with the remarks quite recently made by Alexander (Ins. Insc. Menstr., 1913, p. 118-120).
8. In my above-quoted paper (p. 584) I said, "Meigen did not state in his paper [of 18001 that he accepted the binominal nomen- clature, and there is nothing in the paper indicating that he did so. Admittedly generic names in works of this class cannot be taken into consideration." Bezzi (in a letter to me) objects to this, and I now find that the same objections have been made al- ready by Coquillett (Canad. Ent., 1908, p. 457) who wrote: "There is, first, the name of the proposed new genus in proper Latin form, then a description of the genus, followed by a state- ment of the number of species known to the author as belonging to the genus." All this is true, save that Meigen did not state the number of species for all his genera, but when Coquillett goes on to say that "the author, therefore, had a correct idea of binomial nomenclature, and, so far as he went, he applied it in this paper," we must take exception to this conclusion. What has Meigen's statement of the number of species belonging to some of his genera to do with binominal nomenclature? There are other authors (after 1758) who, though well aware of the binominal nomencla- ture, did not accept it but continued to designate their species by short diagnoses instead of specific names. Among these authors was even a fellow-countryman of Linnaeus himself, who described many new species of insects without specific names. Briefly, the facts are these: we know that Meigen accepted the binominal nomenclature in 1803 and 1804, but we do not know if he did so in 1800, and the code forbids the recognition of names in such works. If we do accept these names, we can as well go back to the genera of the pre-Linnean period and revive them. To say the least, there are no cogent reasons why these names should be accepted, and such reasons failing we can safely follow Meigen's own lead and quit them for ever.




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19151 Bergroth-Some Tipulid Synonymy 59
9. Some authors-among American dipterists, Johnson and Alexander-have adopted the principle that if two (or more) species have been described in the same genus under the same specific name, the species described later must be renamed even if the two species now belong to quite different genera. Johnson has, for instance, given a new name to Oropeza annulata Say., because it was described as a Tipula, and there is a Tipula annulata of Linn6, which now is referred to Discobola, a widely different genus. Had Say. wrongly cited Linn6's species as being the same as his own, the change would be just, but now it is quite unneces- sary, and the general acceptance of such a principle would lead to disastrous consequences. Between 1758 and 1830 a very great number of species was described, but referred to a comparatively very small number of genera. The consequence of this is that the number of specific names preoccupied in this sense is immense, not in Diptera, as so many genera were founded as early as 1803, but in many other groups, as Lepidoptera and Mollusca. If all classes of animals are considered, the number of species, which must be renamed according to this rule, amounts to thousands. Kirkaldy's catalogue of the Pentatomidse and some of his minor articles, with their sweeping and useless alterations of specific names, are a good warning in this respect; fortunately almost no hemipterist seems to have taken any notice of his new names of this class. As Sherborn's bulky volume, "Index animalium9'- a result of many years' work-only includes the species described till 1800, and few persons have time and liking for looking up names preoccupied in this sense, it is a matter of course that the eventual new names alleged to be necessary in such cases could be introduced only little by little. In the meantime not even our most familiar names of animals could be safe from a sudden rebaptizing. As a confusion of two species bearing the same specific name, but belonging to different - genera, is out of the question, a change of names in such cases serves no purpose, and it is sincerely to be hoped that zoologists who have accepted the contrary principle would reconsider the position they have taken in reference to this matter. It is true that we then have to restore some of the older names now standing as synonyms, but the num- ber of these names is very small as compared to the names of the other class.




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