Lepidiota Kirby, 1828 —generic characters

The most speciose genus of Australian Melolonthini is Lepidiota Kirby, 1828, with, following the transfer of six species (Allsopp 2018) to Alepida Allsopp, 2018, 55 Australian species currently attributed to it. Other species ascribed to it occur through the Solomon Islands, New Guinea, Indonesia, Philippines, Palau, southern China, and on to the Indian subcontinent (Krajcik 2011; Weir et al. 2019). As its name suggests (Greek lepidos, a scale, and iota, anything very small), a characteristic feature is the presence on the dorsal surface and at least part of the ventral surface of small, near-circular, white scales each contained within a puncture (Figs. 1, 26). The genus is also defined by a three-lamellate antennal club (Blackburn 1911; Britton 1978) and males have parameres that are usually asymmetrical and often bizarrely shaped (see figures in Britton 1978).

Britton (1978) and Weir et al. (2019) included Lepidiota at three points in their keys to genera of Australian Melolonthini —one group having antennae with nine antennomeres with three-lamellate clubs (couplet 2); the second having antennae with 10 antennomeres with three-lamellate clubs (couplet 7); the third with antennae with 10 antennomeres with up to five long lamellae and with antennomere 5 with a lamella up to 0.6 times the length of the lamella on antennomere 6 (couplet 20 or 22, respectively). The third group is obviously inconsistent with the generic characters of Lepidiota.