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Hemiandrus maculifrons is a species of ground weta (Heniandrus Walker, 1869) endemic to New Zealand. They are nocturnal, carnivorous, and flightless orthopterans belonging to the family Anostostomatidae. A part from Hemiandrus, Anostostomatidae consists of 3 other genera, the tree weta (Hemideina White, 1846), the giant weta (Deinacrida White, 1846), and the tusked weta (Anisoura Ander, 1938, Motuweta Johns, 1997); with Hemiandrus being the most speciose group, and H. maculifrons being the most widespread Hemiandrus species in New Zealand. Being a nocturnal ground weta, they remain in underground galleries during daytime and emerge from their burrows after sunset to forage and hunt for small invertebrates. H. maculifrons is one of the smallest weta, averaging 15mm in length (from the head to the tip of the last abdomenal segment, excluding ovipositor in females) and weighing 1-3g. Unlike the tree weta and tusked weta where sexual dimorphism is found in the form of male weaponry, ground weta only exhibit sexual size dimorphism with the females being bigger.

Images available: Southern Alps Photography

Morphology
H. maculifrons are characterized by a dark brown pronotum and upper abdomen, and a mottled femur. They are small to medium-sized, about 15mm in length from the head to the tip of the abdomen. The head is shiny and brown with a darker shade on top, showing a faint pale dorsal midline. The antennae are longer than the body and the eyes are black. Unlike other closely related species, such as tree weta and tusked weta that exhibit sexual dimorphism in the form of male weaponry, ground weta are sexually sized dimorphic; with females being larger than males. Females also have a long ovipositor protruding from the end of the abdomen whereas males do not.

Distribution and Habitat
H. maculifrons is the most widespread ground weta species and the most widespread anostostomatid in New Zealand. It is the only species that extends across Cook Strait and occurs on both the North and South Island. They can be found in native forests throughout the South Island, and have been reported in: Taranaki; the Kaweka Ranges; Tongariro National Park; the western Tararua Ranges; Orongorongo Valley; and on the Coromandel Peninsula in the North Island. They live in galleries under moss, soil, leaf litter and under rotting logs. Galleries can extent up to 10 cm below the surface of the soil or moss and are usually slightly wider than the body length of the weta. Galleries constructed under rotting logs often incorporate the log into one side of the gallery.

Diet
H. maculifrons are primarily predators and scavengers, they usually hunt and forage in forest litter and in trees at night. Both adults and juveniles eat a range of small invertebrates such as beetles, moths, and flies. However, there is a single case where mountain snowberry (Gaultheria depressa) seeds had been found in the faeces of a H. maculifrons individual.

Courtship and Copulation
Unlike other singing ensiferans, ground weta do not have tibial tympanae. Sexually active males hit their abdomens on substrates, such as leaf or soil surfaces, to produce pre-copulation vibratory sounds as signals for mate attraction: this is know as drumming The number of abdomen hits on the substrate, the duration of the drumming, and the intervals between drumming all differ between different species, these vibrations are believed to be species-specific. Pheromones produced from anal secretions may be involved in long distance communication. After locating a mate, the male and female come into an antennal contact. If the female is accepted by the male, the male then turns to face the same direction as the female and backs under the her, or alternatively the female mounts the male. Once underneath the female, the male transports the spermatophlax to the female through genital contact. *explain that thing is sticking to the female

Nuptial Feeding and Post-copulatory Guarding
Males of the members of the orthopteran family provide a nuptial gift to the female. The nuptial gift is produced from a gland on the dorsal surface of the male's metanotum, and females consume this during copulation. The female also bends to eat the spermatophylax post-copulation. The nuptial gift is considered a mechanism which increases the number of sperm transferred into the female, by delaying the female from removing the spermatopylax. Studies also show that nuptial gives provide females with additional resources (amino acids) which the females allocate into their ovaries and eggs, thus increases egg production and egg quality. The males remain with the females after copulation while she consumes the spermatophylax. Post-copulatory guarding is thought to keep rivals males from distrupting insemination.

Oviposition and Maternal Care
Female H. maculifrons has long ovipositor which it use to insert its eggs into the walls of its galleries. H. maculifron exhibit maternal care of eggs or young, observations on adult females found that they remain in their galleries without emerging with the eggs for several months after oviposition, and tending to nymphs; parental care is unusually for long ovipositor species. It may take a several days for the females to oviposit a batch of eggs, and egg incubation period is around 12 – 18 months, environmental conditions such as seasonal temperature fluctuations will impact egg development, thus the incubation period.

Taxonomy
H. maculifrons was first described by Walker in 1869. In 1997, Johns synonymised two described Hemiandrus speciesH. maori (Pictet and Saussure 1893) and H. gracilis (Salmon 1950) with H. maculifrons. H. maculifrons comprises multiple clades, both specimens used by Pictet and Saussure (1893) and Salmon (1950) for their description appeared to belong to the same species of the H. maculifrons complex which were from the southern-most populations. Therefore, the southern-most species of this complex retained the name H. maculifrons whilst the others were given new names.

Morphological and genetic data indicated that H. maculifrons was not a single species but a cryptic species complex: two new species (1) Hemiandrus lunasp. nov and (2) Hemiandrus brucei sp. nov had been separated from the specific name H. maculifrons.