Chrysobothris

Abstract: Chrysobothris eriogoni Westcott, new species (Buprestidae), from Oregon and Washington is described and figured. New synonymy is presented under Acmaeodera haemorrhoa LeConte (=A. bouvieri Kerremans) and A. solitaria Kerremans (=A. thoracica Kerremans). Biological, distributional and taxonomic notes are presented for 43 other species in the following genera: Acmaeodera, Acmaeoderoides, Acmaeoderopsis, Agrilus, Anambodera, Anthaxia, Brachys, Buprestis, Chrysobothris, Dicerca, Paratyndaris, Poecilonota, Spectralia.

Abstract: The genus Chrysobothris Eschscholtz is one of the oldest buprestid genus-group names (Eschscholtz 1829), one of the largest buprestid genera (706 species, 36 subspecies vide Bellamy 2008:1587–1696) and one of only two truly cosmopolitan buprestid genera (Agrilus Curtis, 1815 being the other). Until recently, species of Chrysobothris were unknown in remote Pacific islands (see Comments below). The addition of this taxon to the list of Fiji Buprestidae increases the total to 50 species and one subspecies in 14 genera, which is certainly a respectably-sized fauna for such a small and remote group of islands. Label data is presented verbatim. Surface sculpture terminology follows Harris (1979). Abbreviations are limited to: BMNH = The Natural History Museum, London and FNIC = Fiji National Insect Collection, Suva.

Abstract: This is a study of buprestids (Buprestidae) from the Jurassic and Lower Cretaceous of European Russia, Southern Kazakhstan and Central Mongolia, which are deposited in the Paleontological Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences. A new subfamily, 13 new genera, and 15 new species of buprestids are described. In addition, a new genus of Lower Cretaceous buprestids from the Spanish province of Lerida is erected. It had been referred without sufficient basis to the extant genus Chrysobothris Esch. Some remarks are made about the morphological evolution of buprestids in the Mesozoic era. Mesozoic buprestids, unlike Cenozoic, are infrequent. The rather numerous Jurassic beetles, including buprestids, from the Solnhofen Shales described by Deichmuller (3), Oppenheim (5), and Handlirsch (4), were revised by Ponomarenko (1, 2). With the exception of Eurythyrea grandis Deichm. (which Deichmuller did not see) only Pseudothyrea oppenheimi, which Handlirsch considered a click beetle, may be reliably referred to the buprestids. Therefore, records of Jurassic buprestids from Russia and Southern Kazakhstan are of considerable interest. Together with Lower Cretaceous buprestids from Southern Mongolia, as well as from other localities in Russia and Mongolia not considered here, they allow certain conclusions regarding the morphological evolution of the Mesozoic Buprestidae. As the record, described below, of the buprestid Ancestrimorpha volgensis gen. et sp. nov. from the Bathovian (Batskiy) Stage testifies, and given the general primitiveness of this species, the complex of principal morphological characters of the Buprestidae was formed no later than the Middle Jurassic. In the Upper Jurassic (Karatau, Solnhofen) some forms are already quite similar to extant ones, as noted by Ponomarenko (1), who pointed out numerous similar features between Pseudothyrea oppenheimi Handl. and the recent subfamily Buprestinae as well as the absence in this species of a complete division of the mesosternum by the posterior process of the prosternum, which is characteristic of the Buprestinae. In Mesozoic buprestids known to me, it has been almost impossible to elucidate the degree of division of the mesosternum by this process, because the body is fractured along this place. Even in cursory examination of Jurassic and Lower Cretaceous Buprestidae one important difference distinguishing all Jurassic and most Lower Cretaceous buprestids from all Recent ones is obvious—the straight or weakly arched paracoxal suture which in all Recent subfamilies except Pages submitted expressly to the Paleontological Journal, and shall not be published in Russian in Paleontologicheskiy Zhumal.

Abstract: In-ground colonies of the native digger wasp, Cerceris fumipennis Say (Hymenoptera: Crabronidae), were sampled over two years in four New York State counties to characterize prey range, primarily their preying on beetles in the metallic wood-boring family, Buprestidae. These records were also used to evaluate beetle sampling efficiency by comparing collected beetles to historic county records and to identify limitations of wasp-mediated sampling in study areas. Overall, 1,530 beetles representing three families and 44 beetle species were collected from C. fumipennis. Five of these species (Agrilus cuprescens (Menetries) (Coleoptera: Buprestidae), A. pensus Horn, Buprestis nutalli Kirby, Chrysobothris scabripennis Gory and Laporte, Dicerca pugionata (Germar)) were new prey records for C. fumipennis. The wasps exhibited a strong preference for larger beetle genera (e.g., Dicerca, Buprestis), which accounted for 68% of beetles caught. Agrilus and Chrysobothris were the next dominant genera, accounting for 16% and 11%, respectively. A 4–19 mm prey size range is proposed, as all beetles collected were within this range despite the availability of prey outside of this range. Cerceris fumipennis caught 43% of the 42 buprestids species present in museum records from the four census counties as well as an additional 23 buprestid species that were not represented in museum records. Of the 22 buprestid species identified in museum collections that were not caught by C. fumipennis in the census counties, only one was within the proposed size range and active during the C. fumipennis flight season (late June through August). Overall, sampling C. fumipennis colonies over two summers at five sites resulted in 32% of the recorded buprestid species in New York State being caught, indicating that monitoring colonies is an efficient and viable means of quantifying buprestid assemblages.