A new species of the genus Scirtothrips (Thysanoptera, Thripidae) from India.

A new species of Scirtothrips is described from India, S. donumdei, collected on leaves of Senegalia pennata (Fabaceae). Partial mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase subunit 1 (mtCOI) gene sequence of the species was sequenced and the annotated sequence was submitted to NCBI GenBank.

A new species of Hydatothrips (Thysanoptera, Thripidae) from India with one new record.

A remarkable new species, Hydatothrips longirostris, with an elongate mouth cone extending to the metasternum is described from India. Dendrothrips glynn Mound, a dendrothripine species, is newly recorded from India.

The Sericothripinae genus Hydatothrips (Thysanoptera, Thripidae) in India with description of a new species.

A new species of Hydatothrips is described from India, H. initium. A key to the ten species of Hydatothrips recorded from India is also provided.

Recent adventive soft scale insects (Hemiptera: Coccomorpha: Coccidae) and mealybugs (Hemiptera: Coccomorpha: Pseudococcidae) in India.

Four species of soft scale insect [Hemiptera: Coccidae: Fistulococcus pokfulamensis Hodgson & Martin, Kilifia deltoides De Lotto, Maacoccus piperis (Green) and Paralecanium machili Takahashi] and two species of mealybug [Hemiptera: Pseudococcidae: Antonina thaiensis Takahashi and Formicococcus simplicior (Green)] are recorded in India for the first time. Each of the six species is comprehensively diagnosed based on Indian material, and compared with earlier descriptions. Keys to the Indian species in their respective genera are provided to facilitate identification. Ecological information on host plants, associated ants and natural enemies is also given.

Studies on Pseudodendrothrips (Thysanoptera, Thripidae) from India, with one new species.

Pseudodendrothrips umbrolateralis sp. n. is described from India. An identification key to the seven Pseudodendrothrips species recorded from India is provided. The earlier record from India of P. bhattii Kudo is considered a misidentification of P. darci (Girault) and hence, is removed from the fauna of India.

Occurrence and spread of Ceroplastes cirripediformis Comstock (Hemiptera: Coccomorpha: Coccidae) in India.

The notoriously destructive and invasive soft scale, Ceroplastes cirripediformis Comstock (Hemiptera: Coccomorpha: Coccidae), is recorded for the first time from India. The scale is redescribed to facilitate its identification and information on its host range, natural enemies and distribution is provided. An identification key to the Indian species in this genus is given. Management options in the event of an outbreak are discussed briefly. The establishment of this scale insect warrants special attention in India as it is a potentially damaging plant pest and has a broad host range across many plant families.

A new species of Neohydatothrips (Thysanoptera: Thripidae) from India.

With 120 described species (ThripsWiki 2020) Neohydatothrips is the most species-rich genus in the Thripidae subfamily Sericothripinae. Although widely distributed almost 70% of the species are from the New World (Lima Mound 2016), with only seven species recorded from India (Rachana Varatharajan 2017). The biology of most species in the genus remains unknown, but they apparently feed and breed on the leaves and/or flowers of various unrelated plants. A few species are economically important as plant pests as well as virus vectors, such as N. variabilis (Beach) (Zhou Tzanetakis 2013; Lima Mound 2016; Han et al. 2019). N. samayunkur (Kudo) is a pest on flowers and leaves of Tagetes spp. in many countries including India (Nakahara 1999; Bhatti et al. 2003). Even though N. gracilipes (Hood) was described originally as damaging cotton in Mexico, it is associated with weedy species of Sida in several countries including central India (Lima Mound 2016). In southern China, N. flavicingulus Mirab-balou, Tong Yang is reported as damaging leaves of Manglietia fordiana. In California, avocado crops are sometimes damaged by N. burungae (Hood) and this species is also recorded as distorting the young leaves of Passiflora in Colombia (Mound et al. 2019). N. gracilicornis (Williams) is reported as damaging Pinaceae and Betulaceae in Spain and South Italy (Marullo 2009). The purpose of this article is to describe a new species from India that was collected in the flowers of Jasminum sambac (Oleaceae) in Assam, northeastern India. A detailed structural diagnosis of this genus is provided by Masumoto and Okajima (2020).

A new species of the genus Lefroyothrips (Thysanoptera: Thripidae) from India.

An identification key is provided to three species of Lefroyothrips recorded from India, including a new species L. varatharajani collected from flowers of Mimusops elengi. Although similar to L. lefroyi in having short ocellar setae on the head, the new species has only a single row of postocular setae.

Redescription and lectotype designation of Gynaikothrips microchaetus Ananthakrishnan & Jagadish (Thysanoptera: Phlaeothripidae).

Gynaikothrips microchaetus Ananthakrishnan and Jagadish (1969) was described from Dharwar in Karnataka, and until now has been known only from southern India (Ananthakrishnan & Sen 1980). The original description was based on an unspecified number of syntypes, with no depositary indicated. However, one of the authors (R. Varatharajan) acquired four slides that are labelled by Ananthakrishnan as this species and bear the same collection details as given in the original description. These are assumed to be syntypes, and one female is here designated as lectotype. The other three slides are of males and are considered as paralectotypes. Further, during extensive surveys for thrips at Dampa Tiger Reserve, Mizoram (23.320 N 92.130 E) and Manipur University campus (24.820 N 93.900 E) during 2014-18, we have collected both sexes of this species from the leaves of Ficus curtipes. The freshly collected specimens were mounted onto microscope slides in Canada balsam, and identified using the keys provided by Ananthakrishnan and Sen (1980). Hence, the species is illustrated and re-described with additional features, based on the type material together with freshly collected specimens from north eastern India, Manipur and Mizoram. The following abbreviations are used for pronotal setae: am-anteromarginals; aa-anteroangulars; pa-posteroangulars; ml-midlaterals; po-postocular; epim-epimerals; abdominal tergite IX setae S1, S2 & S3-setal pairs I, II and III respectively (S1 nearest the mid-line).

A new species of the genus Thrips (Thysanoptera: Thripidae) from the Western Ghats of India.

Thrips laurencei sp.n. is described from specimens collected on flowers of Hydrangea macrophylla in Western Ghats range of Tamil Nadu, India. This new species shows sexual dimorphism in colour, with the females brownish yellow with brown shadings but the males uniformly yellow.