ZOOTAXA ISSN 1175-5326 (print edition) ISSN 1175-5334 (online edition) Accepted by J. Klimaszewski: 21 Apr. 2020; published: 19 May 2020 289 Zootaxa 4779 (2): 289–296 https://www.mapress.com/j/zt/ Copyright © 2020 Magnolia Press Article https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.4779.2.10 http://zoobank.org/urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:52571CFB-BA39-4B6D-83C5-2DC1BDAE4542 Three new species and new records of Stenichnodes Franz (Coleoptera: Staphylinidae: Scydmaeninae) PAWEŁ JAŁOSZYŃSKI Museum of Natural History, University of Wrocław, Sienkiewicza 21, 50-335 Wrocław, Poland. scydmaenus@yahoo.com; https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2973-1803 Abstract Three new species of Stenichnodes Franz are described, all placed in the nominotypical subgenus, and occurring in Ivory Coast: S. cordicollis sp. n., S. spinosus sp. n., and S. bouakensis sp. n. Stenichnodes (s. str.) error Jałoszyński is recorded from a second locality in Kenya, and S. (Parastenichnaphes) ceylonensis (Franz), previously known to occur in Sri Lanka, is recorded from Tamil Nadu, India. Two of the newly described species are unusual in having the aedeagi with parameres; diagnostic value of this character, and the presence or absence of metaventral carinae, are discussed. Key words: Stenichnini, Afrotropical, Oriental, new species Introduction Stenichnodes Franz, 1966 belongs to a group of genera characterized by the presence of lateral sutures demarcating the submental region. It was established to accommodate a single species, S. saheliensis Franz, 1966, known to oc- cur in Chad Republic. Two Oriental species described by the same author were placed in Parastenichnaphes Franz, 1984, a subgenus of Stenichnaphes Franz, 1980. Parastenichnaphes was later elevated to genus rank (Franz 1989), and most recently Jałoszyński (2015) reduced this taxon to a subgenus of Stenichnodes. Currently two Afrotropi- cal species, from Chad and Kenya, are placed in Stenichnodes s. str., and two Oriental species (from Sri Lanka and Sumatra), are included in the subgenus Parastenichnaphes (Jałoszyński 2005, 2015, 2019). In the present paper results of examination of Scydmaeninae collected in Ivory Coast are reported, and Stenich- nodes is recorded for the first time in the western region of tropical Africa. Additionally, new records for Afrotropi- cal and Oriental Stenichnodes species are given. Materials and Methods Dry-mounted specimens were relaxed in warm water; aedeagi were mounted in Canada balsam. Habitus images were taken using a Gryphax Prokyon digital camera (Jenoptik) mounted on a Leica M205C stereoscopic micro- scope; aedeagi were photographed with a Nikon D7500 camera mounted on a Nikon Eclipse Ni compound micro- scope. Image stacks were processed using Helicon Focus v. 6.8.0 (HeliconSoft Ltd.). Morphological structures were figured by freehand drawing, with exact proportions and general shapes sketched from photographs. The terminol- ogy follows that of Jałoszyński (2015). The measurements and abbreviations are as follows: AeL—length of aedeagus AnL—length of antennae, measured in dorsal view BL—body length, a sum of lengths of head, pronotum and elytra measured separately EI—elytral index, length of elytra divided by their combined width EL—length of elytra measured along suture, from base to apex (excluding apical spines, if present)