Female macroptera. Body dark brown, mid and hind tibiae yellow; fore wings white with two dark cross bands. Antennae 8-segmented, segments slender; forked sensoria on III–IV long and slender. Head slightly wider than long; 3 pairs of ocellar setae, pair III longer than side of ocellar triangle, arising between anterior margins of posterior ocelli. Pronotum with anteromarginal and 2 pairs of posteroangular setae elongate; posterior margin with one pair of minor setae; pronotal surface with little sculpture. Metanotum almost without sculpture medially, median setae not at anterior margin. Prosternal basantra without setae, ferna well separated. Mesofurca with stout spinula, metafurca with diffuse spinula. Fore wing first vein with 3 setae on distal half, second vein with 3 setae. Tergites covered with equiangular reticulation; tergite VIII posteromarginal comb long and regular; tergite X without dorsal split. Sternites with 3 pairs of marginal setae, median setae on VII in front of margin.
Male macroptera. Smaller than female but similar in colour; tergite IX with 2 stout thorn-like setae each on a large tubercle, and posterior to these a group of 5 small tubercles; sternites without pore plates.
Ayyaria chaetophora is the only species in this genus. Superficially similar to some species of Frankliniella, there are no abdominal ctenidia, and the forewing bears interrupted setal rows. The reticulation also suggests a relationship to the Panchaetothripinae, but the mesofurcal spinula is well developed.
India, Christmas Island (Indian Ocean), Taiwan, Japan, Philippines, Tahiti, Australia.
Northern Australia.
Feeding and breeding on leaves.
Adults have been found on various unrelated plants, particularly Glycine max (Fabaceae) also Tagetes sp., (Asteraceae), Ricinus communis (Euphorbiaceae).
Ayyaria chaetophora Karny
Wilson TH. 1975. A monograph of the subfamily Panchaetothripinae (Thysanoptera: Thripidae). Memoirs of the American Entomological Institute 23: 1-354.