2 NEW SPECIES OF RHAGOVELIA FROM THE PHILIPPINES, WITH A DISCUSSION OF ZOOGEOGRAPHIC RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN THE PHILIPPINES AND NEW-GUINEA (HETEROPTERA, VELIIDAE)

Two new species of Rhagovelia are described from the Philippines: R. r adicula from Mindanao, Leyte, and Luzon, and R. phoretica from Negros. R. ridicula belongs to the orientalis group as defined by Polhemus an d Polhemus (1988), being the apparent sister species to R. aberrans An dersen, while R. phoretica belongs to a distinctive intrageneric dade defined herein as the caesius group, whose only other members occur on New Guinea. The male paramere of R. werneri Hungerford and Matsuda is figured, and its structure is shown to be correlative to that of a mo nphyletic group of species occurring on New Caledonia and in the highl ands of New Guinea, thus supporting the placement of this species in t he novacaledonica group of Polhemus and Polhemus (1988). The evidence of a sister area relationship between the Philippines and New Guinea a s indicated by the disjunct distributions of taxa in the caesius and n ovacaledonica species groups is discussed, and possible tectonic mecha nisms that could have led to such a disjunction are evaluated.