Family Delphacidae

Subfamily Stenocraninae

Tribe Stenocranini

Distribution: Southern Africa (Liburnia is a synonym of the African genus Embolophora, see below).

Type species (in original combination): Embolophora monoceros Stål, 1855.

Note: The genus Liburnia has a long history of being a taxonomic 'junk' genus in the Delphacini.  Part of the difficulty with this genus was correctly ascribing the proper type species to it since three type species had been proposed.  Recently, following a proposal to fix the type species of Liburnia as Embolophora monoceros (Stenocraninae; see Bartlett 2008), ICZN (2010) decided that "Liburnia Stål, 1866 was proposed by its author as a junior objective synonym of Embolophora Stål, 1853. Consequently, the type species for both is Embolophora monoceros Stål, 1855, regardless of Stål’s (1866) intentions".  

This statement has clarified that Liburnia is a junior synonym of Embolophora (Stenocraninae), and all species currently placed in Liburnia need to be reassigned to a genus in the proper tribe.

Recognized species

As Embolophora (see Asche, 1983):

Embolophora britmusei Asche, 1983 - South Africa, Angola
Embolophora monoceros Stal, 1855 - South Africa, Sudan , Zaire, Uganda, Nigeria
Embolophora theroni Asche, 1983 - South Africa

As Liburnia (all misplaced)

Most of these species are obscure.  Some are being moved to new genera within a manuscript in preparation.

New World

Liburnia mexicana (Crawford, 1914) - Mexico

Liburnia paludata (Fowler, 1905 - Guatemala, Mexico

Liburnia williamsi (Muir, 1926) - Ecuador

Liburnia breviceps - see Nothodelphax

Liburnia pseudoseminigra - see Syndelphax

Old World  (This list may include synonyms that I have missed)

Liburnia albovittata Matsumura, 1931 - China, India, Malaysia, Taiwan (See Metcalf, 1943; perhaps = Terthron albovittatum (Matsumura, 1900); the problem of this entry in the Metcalf catalog has been solved, but I am not sure what the solution is).
Liburnia antennata Jacobi, 1910 - "Tanganyika Territory" (= Rwanda, Burundi, and Tanzania)
Liburnia astyanax (Kirkaldy, 1907) - Australia: New South Wales
Liburnia atromaculata Distant, 1916 - India
Liburnia centralis (Signoret, 1860) - Madagascar, Ile of Bourbon (Indian Ocean), Somaliland
Liburnia coracina Csiki, 1940 - Albania
Liburnia flavina (Melichar, 1914) - Indonesia
Liburnia furca Bierman, 1898 - Indonesia
Liburnia hemifusca (Melichar, 1914) - Indonesia
Liburnia intrudens (Muir, 1930) - Verlaten Island (East Indies)
Liburnia javana Bierman, 1910 - Indonesia
Liburnia sancti-pauli Jeannel, 1947 - St. Paul Is.
Liburnia testacea deCarlini, 1895 - Somaliland
Liburnia transversalis Melichar, 1914) - Indonesia
Liburnia typhlocyba Bierman, 1910 - Indonesia
Liburnia vanreeneni (Muir, 1929) - Indonesia

Recorded hosts: .

None for the species reported above.

Economic importance:  Limited for the species reported above.

Recognition:

Species currently in Liburnia are a varied, unrelated collection of taxa.

Embolophora are long-headed African stenocranines.

Embolophora britmusei

Embolophora monoceros

Molecular resources

At this time, neither GenBank or BOLD list sequence data for any species in Embolophora (and do not include any sequence data for species misplaced in Liburnia).

Selected references

Asche, M. 1983. Zur Kenntnis der Gattung Embolophora Stal, 1853 (Homoptera Cicadina Fulgoromorpha Delphacidae). Marburger Entomologische Publikationen 1(8): 167-196.

Bartlett, C.R. 2008. Liburnia Stål, 1866 (Insecta, Hemiptera, Delphacidae): proposed designation of Embolophora monoceros Stål, 1855 as the type species. Bulletin of Zoological Nomenclature 65(3): 183-187.

Cherry, R.H., P. Stansly, R. Nagata and S. Halbert. 2006.Liburnia pseudoseminigra (Delphacidae: Homoptera), a New and Unusual Pest of St. Augustine Grass. Florida Entomologist 89(4): 459-461.

ICZN 2010. OPINION 2260 (Case 3460) Liburnia Stål, 1866 (Insecta, Hemiptera, DELPHACIDAE): proposed designation of Embolophora monoceros Stål, 1855 as the type species. Bulletin of Zoological Nomenclature 67(4): 340-341.

Jeannel, E. 1947. Croisiere du Bougainville aux iles australes francaises XIII. Hemopteres. Memoires du Museum National d'Histoire Naturelles, Paris (N. S.) 20: 1-24.

Stål, C. 1866a. Hemiptera Homoptera Latr. Hemiptera Africana 4. (Stockholm: Officina Norstedtiana). 276 pp.