Anisopleura cf. qingyuanensis Zhou, 1982



Immature male.  A quite artsy shot - but pure luck!  

Note the wings strongly tinged with yellow  to the level of nodus.

This stunning little fellow settled and posed very cooperatively.

I came across this forest damselfly from July to September, at two different montane and submontane sites around Hanoi (50 km from each other). 

Immature male: extreme apex of forewings not yet dark brown, cyan blue face.  

Labrum, postclypeus, genae and lateral side of head along the eye-margin cyan blue in younger stage.

Labrum, postclypeus, genae and lateral side of head along the eye-margin creamy blue-green (cyan blue in younger stage). Two blue lateral spots on outer side of each lateral ocellus.
Legs black, with a greenish stripe on outer sides of two posterior pairs of femora.
Wings hyaline, suffused with yellow-orange to the level of nodus, forewings of mature males with extreme apex dark brown.
Abdomen predominantly black with yellow markings on sides.
S9-10 with pruinescence on dorsum in the male. Caudal appendages bluish-grey. Superiors broad and flattened, slightly overlapping each other, dorsal surface shallowly hollowed forming a spoon shaped structure, with a robust ventro-lateral fork visible both from above and from the side. Inferiors rudimentary, not visible in profile.

The superior appendages look strange and are quite different from the figures in Zhou's description in which the ventro-lateral fork is NOT visible from above. But according to M. Hämäläinen (pers. comm.), in dried specimens the appendages are often badly overlapping, only by removing one appendage reveals its real structure. The colour pattern is similar as in quingyuanensis. But better to collect specimens to be sure. 

Male adult.

Male adult in hand.

Cerci from above - note the robust ventro-lateral fork.

 A male in the bed of a 6-7 meters wide open forest stream, resting on rocks by the boiling waters.

 A male well hidden in the jungle, perching in sun-lit leave in the shady stream.

I also saw the female, but only got a fleeting glimpse. I was able to get to get a clear view for just a single frame before she moved off to another spot. She is almost identical to the male in color pattern and markings. 

Some remarks about the Anisopleura species :

Three of the about 10 known species of Anisopleura species are recorded from Vietnam : A. qingyuanensis Zhou, 1982, A. bipugio Hämäläinen & Karube, 2013 and Anisopleura yunnanensis Zhu & Zhou, 1999. 

-A. qingyuanensis is a widespread species in southern China (Guangdong, Guanxi, Zhejiang). It has been recorded from a few localities in northern and central Vietnam, among them Tam Dao. 
-A. bipugio has been described recently from central Vietnam (Lam Dong Province). It differs from all known Anisopleura species by having long horns in the posterior lobe of the prothorax.
- Anisopleura yunnanensis Zhu & Zhou, 1999 has been described from three locations in northwest Yunnan (China) and recorded from Diding Natural Reserve, west Guangxi (Wilson and Reels, 2003), 30km from the Sino-Vietnamese border. Male have characteristic oval-shaped markings on dorsum of synthorax, as the following species. In May 2014, Tom Kompier found it in Yen Bai Province, 1st record for Vietnam.


Some other species are likely to occur in Vietnam:

- Anisopleura furcata Selys, 1891 is widely distributed in northern Thailand, southern China and Myanmar, and is likely to be present in suitable habitat within northern Laos and northern Vietnam.
- Anisopleura yunnanensis Zhu & Zhou, 1999* has recently been described from three locations in northwest Yunnan (China) and recorded from Diding Natural Reserve, west Guangxi (Wilson and Reels, 2003), 30km from the Sino-Vietnamese border. Male have characteristic oval-shaped markings on dorsum of synthorax, as the following species. 
- Anisopleura subplatystyla Fraser, 1927. Known from North-east India and Thailand. According to Hämäläinen (2003), it should be confirmed whether subplatystyla and yunnanensis are distinct species or represent a single, somewhat variable species. A female of either subplatystyla or yunnanensis has been found in 2002 in Sa Pa, Lao Cai Province (Hämäläinen, 2013). A. lieftincki was shown to be a junior synonym of A. subplatystyla (Hämäläinen & Subramanian, 2014). 
- A. zhengi Yang, 1996. A zhengi differs from A qingyuanensis only slightly. The stout lateral projection of the superior appendage is visible when viewed dorsally in zhengi whereas this projection is masked by the main flattened body of the superior appendage in qingyuanensis. Described from Shaanxi Province in north-west China.
Recently, Zhang & Hämäläinen (2014) described a new species from Yunnan (A. pelecyphora), also likely to occur in northern Vietnam.

According to Hämäläinen and Karube (2013), Anisopleura species are inhabitants of montane and submontane streams in regions to the south and east of the Himalayan range. The westernmost localities (of A. comes Hagen, 1880) are in the Punjab Hills and Himachal Pradesh in north-west India, the easternmost localities (of A. qingyuanensis Zhou, 1982) are in Zhejiang (China), the northernmost (of A. zhengi Yang, 1996) in south-western Shaanxi (China) and the southernmost (of A. trulla Hämäläinen, 2003) in Khao Poh Ta mountains in the border area of Ranong and Phangnga provinces in southern Thailand.