Genus Procryptotermes · 前砂白蚁属

Morphology

The descriptions below are an adaptation of the original genus-level accounts; terms follow the meaning of the source, and the original is not transcribed verbatim.

Diagnostic characters

The alate resembles Cryptotermes in all respects; the soldier has longer mandibles and a less shield-like frons, and the anterior margin of the pronotum is straight, not serrate.

Alate

Reddish brown to brown; eyes small, 0.34–0.39 mm in diameter, ocelli touching the compound eye; antennae 16–18 segments; the first and second marginal teeth of the left mandible much smaller at the base than the third marginal tooth, the anterior margin of the third marginal tooth about 1.5 times the posterior margins of the first and second marginal teeth; molar plate of the right mandible distinctly shorter than the posterior margin of the second marginal tooth; pronotum as wide as or wider than the head; radial sector with 4–5 branches, the first branch at about 1/3 of the wing length; media weak, unsclerotised, lying between the radial sector and the cubitus over the proximal half of the wing, curving towards the radial sector at about the middle of the wing or further back; arolium present.

Soldier

Head long, the sides almost parallel; front inclined downwards towards the clypeus at about 45°; a distinct ridge between the frons and the vertex, with a shallow U-shaped notch in the middle of the ridge in P. fryeri and a few species, the ridge weaker or absent in some species; two pairs of angular processes on the anterior sides of the head: one pair near the lateral margins of the clypeus, in front of the antennal sockets, the other extending forwards and downwards from the lower sides of the mentum; in some species the upper or lower processes are weaker; eyes colourless; antennae 11–16 segments, the third usually long and club-shaped, longer than the second, the third shorter than the second in P. rapae; mandibles 1.28–1.58 mm long, thick at the base, with a tubercle, toothed in most species, toothless in P. fryeri; pronotum as wide as the head, distinctly transversely arched, the anterior margin shallowly or deeply concave; femora not swollen.

Sources: Krishna K. 1961. A generic revision and phylogenetic study of the family Kalotermitidae (Isoptera). Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 122: 303–408., pp. 376–378 This text is an adaptation, not a verbatim transcription of the original.