Hebrus ( Hebrus ) sp.

Cianferoni, Fabio & Dia, Aref, 2025, Annotated catalogue and checklist of Gerromorpha, Nepomorpha, and Leptopodomorpha (Hemiptera: Heteroptera) of Lebanon, with new records, Zootaxa 5725 (1), pp. 1-54 : 12

Hebrus ( Hebrus) sp. [records published as H. pusillus , not examined]

Hebrus pusillus (Fallén) : Lindberg (1922: 16), “ Beirut, am Flusse Nahr el Beirut ”. Possible misidentification (suspected); Nieser & Moubayed (1986: 248), “ Liban […] Hammana […] 1 ♀ ”. Possible misidentification (suspected).

Hebrus pusillus Fabr. [sic!]: Horváth (1929a: 332), “Bcharré im Libanon ”. Possible misidentification (suspected).

Remarks. The published records for H. pusillus (Fallén, 1807) from Lebanon are doubtful and require confirmation (see also Aukema et al. 2013, Kment et al. 2016). The identification as H. pusillus included by Nieser & Moubayed (1986) is not confirmed in view of the modern taxonomy of the genus; unfortunately, is not simple to locate where that voucher material is (N. Nieser, pers. comm., 28 June 2019).

The published records could belong to other taxa, e.g. H. pilipes Kanyukova, 1997 , H. pusillus arabicus Linnavuori, 1971 , H. j. jeanneli Poisson, 1944 , H. acutiscutatus Brown, 1951 , whose exact range is still not defined (F. Cianferoni, pers. obs.), or maybe also to the previous species: H. montanus . See also the note ot the following taxon below. Thus, we prefer preventively to do not report them at species level.

Hebrus ( Hebrus) sp. [material examined]

Material examined. Survey material: Basin of Sayniq: Ouadi El Leimoun at bridge, 15.VI.2008, 1 ♀ submacr., CFC .

Remarks. Among the studied material, there is a single female from southern Lebanon which is apparently similar to H. pusillus and H. pilipes but it shows long golden hairs especially on clavus similar to H. montanus or H. jeanneli . However, these latter species (and others) clearly differ because of the shape and size of their metanotal elevation. The specimen from Lebanon shows also a slightly reduced metanotal elevation in comparison to H. pusillus and H. pilipes . However, being the specimen submarcropterous this could affect the development of the metanotal elevation which should be normally slightly reduced in comparison to full winged specimen.

However, it is currently not possible to correctly establish whether this specimen should be assigned to a known taxon or it could belong to an undescribed species. Pending further research based also on males we also indicate this specimen as Hebrus ( s.s.) sp.