Odontosphaeropyx matasi Quicke & Butcher, sp. n. from Thailand is described and illustrated. The new species represents the first known record of Odontosphaeropyx from outside of the Afrotropical Region. A key is provided to separate it from the apparently closely related O. flavifasciatus Zettel, 1990, with which it shares almost identical colouration, very different from the other five known species.

Cheloninae , parasitoid, Afrotropical, Oriental, range extension, new taxon

The Cheloninae is a large cosmopolitan subfamily of ovo-larval parasitoids of Lepidoptera (Shaw and Huddleston 1991, Quicke 2015). It is dominated in terms of numbers of species by three genera, Ascogaster Wesmael, 1835, Chelonus Panzer, 1806, and Phanerotoma Wesmael, 1838, which are collectively represented by more than 1500 described species (Yu et al. 2016). However, worldwide another 16 genera (including the Adeliini) are known, most with more restricted geographic distributions and often known from only a few species and specimens (Zettel 1990, He et al. 1994, Kittel and Austin 2014). The OdontosphaeropyginiZettel 1990 (= PseudophanerotominiZettel 1990, synonymized by Braet et al. 2014) are a monotypic tribe with six included species, all in Odontosphaeropyx Cameron, and all from the Afrotropical region (Kittel et al. 2016). Here we report the discovery of the first species from outside of Africa and describe a new species of Odontosphaeropyx of Thailand.

The discovery of the new species was the result of the extensive TIGER (Thailand Inventory Group for Entomological Research) programme which sampled insects in 25 national parks in Thailand over a three-year period, 2006–2008 (see http://sharkeylab.org/tiger). This programme yielded many thousands of braconid wasp specimens. Among these we discovered two specimens of a relatively large-bodied chelonine, with a single clypeal tooth, fore wing vein (RS+M)a arising from vein 1-M well removed from parastigma, forewing vein m-cu joining (RS+M)a basal to 2RS, and with a pair of transverse sutures on the carapace. Initial generic identification based on the known Asian fauna was problematic, so we used the key to world genera and tribes of Zettel (1990) and obtained a clear identification as Odontosphaeropyx which was previously known from six described species, all from sub-Saharan Africa and Madagascar (Braet et al. 2014).

Terminology follows van Achterberg (1988) except for wing venation nomenclature which follows Sharkey and Wharton (1997); see also fig. 2.2 in Quicke (2015) for comparison of wing venation naming systems.

Specimens were imaged using an Olympus SXZ16 microscope with automated multiple image capture at pre-set focal levels using an Olympus DP72 camera, and image combination using the Cell^D image processing system.

Collection abbreviations: CUMZ (Collection of the Insect Museum, Chulalongkorn University Museum of Natural History, Bangkok); QSBG (Queen Sirikit Botanic Gardens, Chiang Mai, Thailand.

The increasing use of Malaise traps in diverse countries is resulting in major range extensions of many braconid taxa (e.g., Sharkey 2004, Tan et al. 2010, Sharkey and Braet 2012, Kittel and Austin 2013, Butcher et al. 2016, Ranjith et al. 2017). Given this, together with the relative paucity of studies on SE Asian Braconidae, it is not too surprising that a principally Afrotropical genus also occurs there. Until 2016 only 373 Braconidae species had been recorded from Thailand (Yu et al. 2016) of which 199 belong to the Rogadinae (largely by BA Butcher and collaborators) and 70 to the Agathidinae (largely as a result of Mike Sharkey’s studies). Material for both of these groups mainly originated from the TIGER (Thailand Inventory Group for Entomological Research) project. Since much of the TIGER material has yet to be systematically investigated taxonomically, with most braconid subfamilies hardly investigated, it is likely that the Thai braconid fauna will eventually be found to be several times larger than the current total.

We are grateful to the Rachadaphiseksomphot Fund, Graduate School, Chulalongkorn University, for the award of a Senior Postdoctoral Fellowship to DLJQ, Center of Excellence in Biodiversity (BDC). Office of Higher Education Commission (BDC-PG2-160007) to BAB. The Animal Systematics Research Unit, Department of Biology, Faculty of Science, Chulalongkorn University, kindly allowed us to use their Cell^D imaging facility. The specimens were collected as part of the TIGER research programme funded by NSF Grant Number: DEB-0542864.