Using wing geometric morphometric in identification of three species of grape cicads (Hem., Cicadidae) in Iran

Subject Areas : entomology and othea arthropods

N. Aghagoli Marzijarani ^{1 *} , F. Mozaffarian ² , R. Vafaei Shoushtari ³

1 - Graduated student, Department of Entomology, Faculty of Agriculture, ّّIslamic Azad university, Arak Branch, Iran
2 - Department of Insect Taxonomy, Iranian Research Institute of Plant Protection, Tehran, Iran
3 - Department of Entomology, Faculty of Agriculture, Islamic Azad university, Arak Branch, Iran

Received: 2011-12-04 Accepted : 2012-08-23 Published : 2013-05-22

Keywords:

Abstract :

Grape cicada Cicadatra alhageos (Kolenati, 1857) is known as one of the important pests in Iran. Two other species of cicadas, Chloropsalta ochreata (Melichar, 1920) and Chloropsalta smaragdula Haupt, 1920 have also been reported on Grape in Iran which both resembles very similar to C. alhageos and diagnosing them is only possible by comparing their male genitalia. In this study, the morphometric variation among the three species was investigated base on their wing shapes. The analyses showed that the length ratio of two portions of veins CuA1 and M1+2 were the most important characters for distinguishing the three species in the field.