Abstract
Identification of Ameles species is a difficult task requiring much experience because of ambiguous descriptions with fewdrawings and great intraspecific morphological variability. Our objective was to find characteristics that could be reliablyused for species identification and would be independent of experience. We identified 12 to 60 specimens of each of 5target species, A. spallanzania (Rossi), A. decolor (Charpentier), A. africana Bolivar, A. picteti (Saussure), A. heldreichiBrunner and 1 to 4 specimens of 7 additional species, A. nana Charpentier, A. kervillei Bolivar, A. modesta Bolivar, A.maroccana Uvarov, A. dumonti Chopard, A. fasciipennis Kaltenbach and A. poggii Lombardo, from the Mediterraneanarea and based on traditional keys. For our analysis, we focused on ten morphological characteristics (lengths of body,pronotum, supracoxal dilatation, fore coxa, fore femur, fore tibia, tegmina, width of the head, minimum width of thepronotum, and maximum width of the fore femur) and five ratios (length to width of the frontal sclerite, pronotum, femur,subgenital plate, and hypophallus), analysed with non-metric multidimensional scaling and linear discriminant analysis.Fewer mis-assignments of species resulted when ratios were used instead of absolute measurements. Among the targetspecies, A. decolor was seldom mis-assigned as another species; A. spallanzania was often mis-assigned as A. africana,while the opposite occurred less frequently; A. picteti was also frequently mis-assigned as A. heldreichi. For the targetspecies, we devised an identification key based on ratios along with morphometric descriptions that appears to work well,because ratios are easily applicable and independent of specimen size. Furthermore, we confirm the synonymy of A.spallanzania and A. africana, recognize that Ameles nana is not a synonym of A. spallanzania, and find that A. poggii is more similar to A. spallanzania than to similar to A. picteti.References
Abu-Dannoun, O. & Katbeh-Bader, A. (2007) Mantodea of Jordan. Zootaxa, 1617, 43–56.
Agabiti, B., Ippolito, S. & Lombardo, F. (2010) The Mediterranean species of the genus Ameles Burmeister, 1838 (Insecta, Mantodea: Amelinae), with a biogeographic and phylogenetic evaluation. Boletín de la Sociedad Entomológica Aragonesa, 47, 1–20.
Albrecht, G.H., Gelvin, B.R. & Hartman, S.E. (1993) Ratios as a size adjustment in morphometrics. American Journal of Physical Anthropology, 91, 441–468.
Chopard, L. (1920) Recherches sur la conformation et le développement des derniers segments abdominaux chez les Orthoptères. Thèses Faculté des Sciences de Paris, Rennes Imprimerie Oberthur, 847, 1–398.
Chopard, L. (1942) Contribution a l’étude des Orthoptéroïdes du Nord de l’Afrique; Extrait des Annales de la Societè entomologique de France, v VIII, p163 ; 1943 Ortoptéroïdes de l’Afrique du Nord; (Mantidae), Paris-Librairie Larose II-N8, pp. 65–71.
Chinery, M. (1987). Guida degli Insetti d’Europa. Franco Muzzio Editore, Padova, pp. 1–359.
Çiplak, B. & Demirsoy, A. (1997) Mantodea (Insecta) fauna of Malatya Vicinity (Turkey) and some remarks on the mantises of Anatolia. Journal of Orthoptera Research, 6, 105–111.
Deitz, L.L., Nalepa, C. & Klass, K.D. (2003) Phylogeny of the Dictyoptera re-examined (Insecta). Entomologische Abhandlungen, 61, 69–91.
Ehrmann, R. (2002) Mantodea: Gottesanbeterinnen der Welt. Münster: Natur und Tier-Verlag, 519 pp.
Floater, G.J. (1996) The Brooks-Dyar rule and morphometrics of the processionary caterpillar Ochrogaster Zunifer Herrich-Schaffer (Lepidoptera: Thaumetopoeidae). Australian Journal of Entomology, 35, 271–278.
Giglio-Tos, E. (1927) Mantidae (Orthoptera) - das Tierreich. Preussische Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin 50, Lieferung, pp. 158–163.
Giri, F. & de Paggi, S.J. (2006) Geometric morphometric and biometric analysis for the systematic elucidation of Brachionus caudatus Barrois and Daday, 1894 (Rotifera Monogononta Brachionidae) forms. Zoologischer Anzeiger, 244, 171–180.
Harz, K. & Kaltenbach, A. (1976) Familie/Family: Mantidae. In: Junk W. (Eds.), The Orthoptera of Europe III, volume 3. Series Entomologica, The Hague, pp. 129–169.
Heller, K. (2004) Fauna Europaea: Mantodea, Amelinae. Fauna Europaea version 1.1. Available from http://www.faunaeur.org (accessed 27 August 2010)
Holwell, G.I., Ginn S.G. & Herberstein M.E. (2007) Three new species of Ciulfina Giglio-Tos (Mantodea: Liturgusidae) from north-eastern Australia. Zootaxa, 1583, 23–35.
Holwell, G.I. (2008) Geographic variation in genital morphology of Ciulfina praying mantids. Journal of Zoology, 276, 108–114.
Jensen, D.J., Svenson, G.J., Song, H. &Whiting, M.F. (2009) Phylogeny and evolution of male genitalia within the praying mantis genus Tenodera (Mantodea: Mantidae). Invertebrate Systematics, 23, 409–421.
Kaltenbach, A. (1963) Kritische Untersuchungen zur Systematik, Biologie und Verbreitung der europäischen Fangheuschrecken (Dictyoptera-Mantidae). Zoologische Jahrbücher Berlin (Systematik), 90, 521–598.
Kaltenbach, A. (1982) Insects of Saudi Arabia, new species and further. Records of Mantodea from Saudi Arabia and Oman. Fauna of Saudi Arabia, 6, 203–208.
Kassam, D.D., Sato, T., & Yamaoka, K. (2002) Comparative Morphometrics and Associated growth trends of two Benthophagous Cichlid species from Lake Malawi (Pisces, Perciformes). Zoologischer Anzeiger, 241, 381–387.
Klingenberg, C.P. & Zimmermann, M. (1992) Dyar's rule and multivariate allometric growth in nine species of waterstriders (Heteroptera: Gerridae). Journal of Zoology, 227, 453–464.
Lombardo, F. (1986) Su alcuni Mantodei della Libia e descrizione di una nuova specie di Ameles. Annali del Museo Civico di Storia Naturale di Genova, 86, 265–272.
Macholàn, M. (2001) Multivariate analysis of morphometric variation in Asian Mus and Sub-Saharan Nannomys (Rodentia: Muridae). Zoologischer Anzeiger, 240, 7–14.
Orci, K.M., Nagy, B., Szövényi, G., Rácz, I.A., Varga, Z. (2005) A comparative study on the song and morphology of Isophya stysi, Cejchan, 1958 and Isophya modestior Brunner von Wattenwyl, 1882(Orthoptera, Tettigoniidae). Zoologischer Anzeiger, 244, 31–42.
Prete, F.R., Hurd, L.E., Branstrator, D. & Johnson, A. (2002) Responses to computer-generated visual stimuli by the male praying mantis, Sphodromantis lineola (Burmeister). Animal Behaviour, 63, 503–510.
R Development Core Team (2009) R: a language and environment for statistical computing. R Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna. Available from http://www.r-project.org/ (accessed 26 June 2009).
Ramsay, G.W. (1990) Mantodea (Insecta), with a review of aspects of functional morphology and biology. In: Duval, C.T. (Ed.), Fauna of New Zealand, Nr. 19, DSIR Publishing, pp. 1–102.
Ramsey M.W., Cairns S.C., & Vaughton G. V. (1994) Geographic variation in morphological and reproductive characters of coastal and tableland populations of Blandfordia granditlora (Liliaceae). P1ant Systematic and Evolution, 192, 215–230.
Saussure, H. (1870) Melanges Orthopterologiques. In: Geneve et Bale H. George, Libraire-Editeur, pp. 248–252.
Stolyarov, M.V. (2009) A preying mantis species (Mantidae) new for the fauna of Russia. Entomological Review, 89, 189–190.
Svenson, G.J. & Whiting, M.F. (2004) Phylogeny of Mantodea based on molecular data:
evolution of a charismatic predator. Systematic Entomology, 29, 359–370.
Svenson, G.J. & Whiting, M.F. (2009) Reconstructing the origins of praying mantids (Dictyoptera, Mantodea): the roles of Gondwanan vicariance and morphological convergence. Cladistics, 25, 468–514.
Symondson, W.O.C., Sunderland, K.D. & Greenstone, M.H. (2002) Can generalist predators be effective biocontrol agents? Annual Review of Entomology, 47, 561–594.
Vignoli, V., Salomone, N., Caruso T. & Bernini, F. (2005) The Euscorpius tergestinus (C.L. Koch, 1837) complex in Italy: biometrics of sympatric hidden species (Scorpiones: Euscorpiidae). Zoologischer Anzeiger, 244, 97–113.
Wahrman, J. (1954) Evolutionary changes in the chromosome complement of the Amelinae (Orthoptera : Mantodea). Experientia, 1, 176–178.
Wahrman, J. & O`Brien R. (1956) The nuclear content of DNA in chromosomal polymorphism in the genus Ameles (Orthoptera: Mantoidea). Journal of Morphology, 99, 259–270.
Whitehead, F.H. (1954) An example of taxonomic discrimination by biometric methods. New Phytologist, 53, 496–510.
Wieland, F. (2006) The cervical sclerites of Mantodea discussed in the context of dictyopteran phylogeny (Insecta: Dictyoptera). Entomologische Abhandlungen, 63, 51–76.
Zelditch, M.L., Swiderski, D.L., Sheets H.D. & Fink, W.L. (2004) Geometric morphometrics for biologists: a primer. Elsevier Academic Press, 456 pp.