Subgenus Bothaella Reinert, 1973
Aedes helenae Reinert, 1973.
Subfamily Culicinae, tribe Aedini, genus Aedes. Subgenus Bothaella includes six species. Subgenus abbreviation – Bot.
Adults of subgenus Bothaella are dark brown to black with distinctive patches of silvery-white scales anteriorly on the vertex, the mesal side of the antennal pedicel, midlobe of the scutellum, antepronotum, upper proepisternal, postspiracular, upper mesokatepisternal, lower mesokatepisternal and upper mesepimeral areas of the thoracic pleura, the laterotergite of abdominal segment I and the lateral areas of abdominal terga II–VII. The erect scales of the head are arranged in a transverse posterior row, the postpronotum lacks scales and a lower anterior mesepimeral seta is present. The hindfemur is largely or completely pale-scaled proximally, hindtarsomeres 1–4 have basal and apical pale bands (except Ae. kleini, in which the hindtarsus is entirely dark-scaled) and both ungues of the fore- and midlegs bear a tooth. The gonostylus of the male genitalia is distinctly enlarged distally, the basal mesal lobe is expanded and heavily setose distally, and the proctiger lacks cercal setae. Bothaella larvae have a well-developed seta 13-P, seta 4-C and seta 6-C inserted far anterior to seta 7-C, seta 5-C and seta 6-C long and single, comb scales arranged in two or more irregular rows, evenly spaced pecten spines, a branched seta 1-S borne distal to the pecten, an incomplete saddle and a ventral brush comprised of eight or nine setae. Pupae have setae 4- and 6-CT, 3-II,III and 5-IV,V very long and single, seta 6-VII anterior to anteromesad of seta 9-VII and no seta 2-Pa. See Aedes.
The monophyly of Bothaella was confirmed in the phylogenetic study of tribe Aedini by Reinert et al. (2009), and was closely associated with Ae. meronephada of subgenus Catatassomyia based on a unique combination of 12 homoplastic characters that are shared by the two taxa: four larval setal, three pupal setal, two adult habitus, two characters of adults, four setal characters of larvae, three setal characters of pupae, two characters of the female genitalia and one character of the male genitalia (Reinert et al. (2009: fig. 2H). Bothaella fell within a polytomy with subgenus Belkinius, subgenus Catatassomyia, and genera Udaya and Zeugnomyia in the phylogeny reconstructed by Wilkerson et al. (2015). In the absence of species of subgenus Catatassomyia, Bothaella was recovered in a sister relationship with subgenera Nyctomyia + Borichinda in the maximum likelihood phylogeny of Soghigian et al. (2017) based on analysis of seven molecular markers.
Bothaella larvae have been collected from rock pools and rock holes, occasionally from tree holes, bamboo stumps and split bamboo. Females have been collected biting humans. Nothing else is known about the bionomics of these mosquitoes.
Species of subgenus Bothaella are not known to be of medical or economic importance to humans.
The species of subgenus Bothaella occur in the Oriental Region, principally Southeast Asia.
Reinert, 1973 (taxonomy); Reinert et al., 2004, 2009 (as genus, morphology, phylogeny); Rattanarithikul et al., 2010 (as genus, Thailand, keys, bionomics); Cook et al., 2010 (as genus, phylogeny, DNA sequence); Wilkerson et al., 2015 (phylogeny, classification); Soghigian et al., 2017 (phylogenetic relationships).
