REVIEW OF THE TEPHRITIS HYOSCYAMI-CONURA GROUP OF SPECIES (DIPTERA: TEPHRITIDAE ) WITH DESCRIPTION OF A NEW SPECIES

The fruit flies of the genus Tephritis associated with the host plants of closely related asteraceous plant species of Cirsium and Carduus (Asteraceae: Cardueae: Carduinae) are revised. In particular, six species of this group known to occur in the western part of the Palaearctic Region are discussed in this article. Three of them, Tephritis conura (Loew 1844), T. hendeliana Hering 1944, and T. hyoseyami (Linnaeus 1758) are widespread, predominantly European species. Two other ones, T. cardualis Hardy 1974 from Pakistan and T. atokaptera Agarwal & Kapoor 1988 from India, were previously known mostly from the original descriptions and are redescribed here. Finally, T. anthrax sp. nov. from Caucasian and Transcaucasia mountains is described. Species are keyed and illustrated. New distribution records and host plants are reported.