Valid Names Results

Ceroplastes madagascariensis (Targioni Tozzetti, 1893) (Coccidae: Ceroplastes)

Nomenclatural History

• Gascardia madagascariensis Targioni Tozzetti 1893: 88. Type data: MADAGASCAR: on an undetermined tree of the Lauraceae. Syntypes, female, Type depository: Paris: Museum National d'Histoire naturelle, France; accepted valid name Notes: Type material probably lost; G. Pellizzari Scaltriti, 1990, personal communication to Yair Ben-Dov. Lectotype (designated in Hodgson & Peronti, 2012): South Africa: Left label: Coll. No. / Natal. (S. Africa) / Richmond / ex.: / Coll. Mr. Fuller; right label states: Lectotype (USDA):
• Ceroplastes candela Cockerell & King in Cockerell 1902g: 113. Type data: SOUTH AFRICA: Natal, Richmond. Syntypes, female, Type depository: Washington: United States National Entomological Collection, U.S. National Museum of Natural History, District of Columbia, USA; junior synonym (discovered by HodgsoPe2012, 76). Notes: Host plant of type material not given.
• Ceroplastes combreti Brain 1920a: 27. Type data: SOUTH AFRICA: De Wildt, Pretoria District, on Combretum sp.. Syntypes, female, Type depository: Pretoria: South African National Collection of Insects, South Africa; junior synonym (discovered by HodgsoPe2012, 76).
• Ceroplastes madagascariensis (Targioni Tozzetti, 1893); MacGillivray 1921: 154. change of combination
• Gascardia combreti (Brain, 1920); De Lotto 1970b: 145. change of combination
• Ceroplastes candella Cockerell & King in Cockerell, 1902; Ben-Dov 1993: 24. misspelling of species epithet

Common Names

Ecological Associates

Hosts:

Families: 3 | Genera: 3

Foes:

Families: 4 | Genera: 6

Geographic Distribution

Keys

• HodgsoWiGi2009: pp.102-104 ( Adult (F) ) [Ceroplastes species of South Africa] Key as: Ceroplastes combreti

Remarks

• Systematics: As far as could be seen by Hodgson & Peronti (2012) on the present specimens of C. candela, the morphology described by Cockerell & King (1902) is also that used to define G. madagascariensis as redescribed by Hodgson (1994a): (i) the exceedingly elongate group of stigmatic setae in each cleft; (ii) the shape of the dorsal setae, which were rather large, club-shaped to parallel-sided and narrower at the base than near their middle; (iii) the spiracular disc-pores with 10 loculi, and (iv) anal plates with 7 or 8 long setae. The dorsal pores are also similar in structure in these 2 species as is the distribution of the ventral tubular ducts. Although the specimens studied here were in poor condition, Hodgson & Peronti (2012) considered that C. candela should be considered a synonym of Ceroplastes (Gascardia) madagascariensis C. combreti was also determined to be extremely similar to C. madagascariensis, differing in only a few small particulars, the most important of which was that the former had fewer stigmatic setae and they did not extend a long way onto the dorsum. On seeing the young specimens of C. madagascariensis from Tulea, Madagascar, where each stigmatic cleft had many fewer stigmatic setae in a group about as long as wide, C. combreti was determined to represent the young adult stage of C. madagascariensis before the massive dorsal extension of the dorsum. Thus, C. combreti also was synonymised with Ceroplastes (Gascardia) madagascariensis.
• Structure: "Young adult female: white, stained rust-brown in the region of the single mediodorsal and seven submarginal nuclei; hemispherical with a mammiform swelling immediately below the two bilateral nuclei; tip of caudal process uncovered." (Newstead, 1908). Old adults: "Adult females exceedingly densely aggregated on twig, so that their bases touched all the way round twig and with their longitudinal axis along length of twig. Covered by a layer of yellowish wax to about same depth as height of insect, so that external appearance of twig was as a rod of wax." (Hodgson, 1994a). With wax removed, young adult female "dorsum with seven large spine-like tubercles and a mediodorsal tubercle; of these the median, anterior and two posterior ones are the shortest; anterior margin clypeate; caudal process shorter but stouter than the tubercle immediately surrounding it." (Newstead, 1908). "Old dried specimens dark brown, very long, with white wax streaks running up the stigmatic grooves...and probably right through the wax to the surface. Caudal process set high on posterior margin of dorsum. Posterior lobes [anal lobes] on either side of anal cleft rather swollen when viewed from side." (Hodgson, 1994a).
• Economic Importance: Paulian (1955) reported about export (in economic importance) from Madagascar of the wax produced by this wax scale.
• General Remarks: Description and illustration of the adult female by Hodgson (1994a).Description and illustration of the adult female given by De Lotto (1970b).

Illustrations

Citations