ZOOTAXA ISSN 1175-5326 (print edition) ISSN 1175-5334 (online edition) Accepted by M. Malipatil: 21 Jan. 2020; published: 26 Feb. 2020 359 Zootaxa 4743 (3): 359–370 https://www.mapress.com/j/zt/ Copyright © 2020 Magnolia Press Article https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.4743.3.3 http://zoobank.org/urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:9C451DB1-794E-4D22-A425-C9BD9697CB56 An overview of the big-eyed bug fauna of French Polynesia (Heteroptera: Lygaeoidea: Geocoridae) PÉTER KÓBOR Hungarian Natural History Museum Department of Zoology, 13 Baross st., H-1082 Budapest, Hungary E-mail: kobor.peter@nhmus.hu Abstract The representatives of the subfamily Geocorinae (Heteroptera: Lygaeoidea) distributed in French Polynesia are reviewed. Germalus ashlocki sp. nov. is described. First occurrence of genus Geocoris Fallén and a Germalus Stål species from New Caledonia are recorded. Diagnoses, keys and discussion of taxa are provided. Keywords: Hemiptera, Geocorinae, Geocoris, Germalus, French Polynesia, new species, key, distribution Introduction The archipelago of French Polynesia comprises five groups of islands and is to be found in the Oceanian biogeo- graphic realm (fig. 1). The realm’s fauna can be generally characterized with the relatively low percentage of indig- enous species in terms of terrestrial taxa (Miller 1996). The insect fauna of the archipelago was extensively studied in the late 1920’s and early 1930’s. In 1924 partici- pants of the St. George Expedition collected representatives of various taxa mostly by the expedition’s official ento- mologist Lucy Evelyn Cheesman (1881–1969) which were deposited in Natural History Museum, London (Hornell et al. 1924). Starting in 1927 Pacific Entomological Survey was formed in association of Hawaiian Sugar Planters’ Association, Association of Hawaiian Pineapple Canners and Bernice P. Bishop Museum, Honolulu, Hawaii (Hale Carpenter 1939). The survey was funded for five years and ended in 1932 (Pacific Entomological Survey 1932, 1939). The main focus of collecting was the Marquesas Islands, the northernmost island group of French Polynesia (Cooke Jr. et al. 1939). As result of the survey four bulletins of BPBM was published: three on the Marquesan and one on the Society Islands fauna. As part of these works foundations on the archipelago’s Heteroptera fauna was published by Van Duzee (1932, 1935). In these studies 6 new species of genus Germalus Stål, 1862 were described and one species [Germalus unicolor (Montandon, 1907)] previously known from the Indomalayan region was recorded for the first time from the archipelago. Van Duzee (1937) published further contributions to the fauna of the region based on the material of Templeton Crocker expedition. Later, Peter D. Ashlock, professor at University of Kansas did extensive collecting and field studies in the ar- chipelago (Slater & Polhemus 1990). In course of the study of his collection borrowed from Snow Entomological Collection a review on the big-eyed bug fauna of French Polynesia was conducted. Materials and methods Specimens studied were borrowed from Bernice P. Bishop Museum, Honolulu, Hawaii (BPBM), P. D. Ashlock’s collection at Snow Entomological Museum, University of Kansas (SEMC), and private collections of Thibault Ra- mage, France (PCTR) and Zdenek Jindra, Czech Republic (PCZJ). Label data are cited verbatim, lines on labels are separated with ‘/’, different labels were separated with ‘//’.