Malagasy assassin bugs (Heteroptera: Reduviidae): Association of dimorphic sexes and immature specimens with adults, synonymy of two genera and four new species

Identification of sexually dimorphic and immature specimens is often challenging to taxonomists even in hemimetabolous insects. Villiers (1949, 1964) described two monotypic genera, Bekilya and Hovacoris of the assassin bug subfamily Peiratinae from Madagascar based on two macropterous male specimens. He also described a third genus, Mutillocoris with two species based on two brachypterous female specimens. Differences in wing form and structural modifications were the primary basis of this generic delineation. To investigate validity of the genera, 150 recently collected specimens from Madagascar were studied with both morphological and molecular techniques. Identical COI sequences between one species of Bekilya and Mutillocoris tricolor Villiers 1964 revealed that they are male and female of the same species. Thus, Bekilya and Mutillocoris were synonomized and Bekilya becomes senior synonym. Phylogenetic analyses based on both morphological and molecular data confirmed the monophyly and thus validity of Bekilya and Hovacoris. Furthermore, molecular data was also used to associate immature specimens with adults of Hovacoris and Bekilya. Morphology is of little value for associating the dimorphic sexes and immature with adults because of their drastic morphological differences. In addition, in the course of this project 4 new species of Bekilya and Hovacoris were described and two species were redescribed.