Morimus asper asper
| Morimus asper asper | ||||||||||||
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Morimus asper asper , male spotted with pine pollen |
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| Systematics | ||||||||||||
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Morimus asper asper | ||||||||||||
| ( Sulzer , 1776) |
Morimus asper asper is a beetle from the family of the longhorn beetle and the subfamily Lamiinae . It differs only slightly from the mourning buck ( Morimus asper funereus ). According to the traditional view, the two beetles are listed as two species Morimus asper and Morimus funereus , but due to the small morphological differences, the mourning buck was declared by Müller in 1950 as Morimus asper funereus to the subspecies of Morimus asper . For this reason, all Morimus asper publicationswritten before 1950 refer to Morimus asper asper . Even with more modern texts, it must be checked whether statements about Morimus asper refer to all subspecies or only to Morimus asper asper , since some authors do not know or do not agree with the taxonomic change made by Müller. According to Müller, the genus Morimus is represented in Europe with only two species, and the species Morimus asper occurs in Europe in three subspecies. Of these, Morimus asper verecundus is ranked as the species by some authors. There is further uncertainty about the form ganglbaueri , which, depending on the author, is classified as a species Morimus ganglbaueri , viewed as a subspecies Morimus asper ganglbaueri , only seen as the result of a cross between Morimus funereus and Morimus asper , or as a color variant of Morimus asper asper as none adopted here taxonomic rank.
The generic name Morimus is from Altgr. μόριμος "mórimos", "destined for death" derived. The Latin name of the species asper ( German rough ) refers to the rough surface of the beetle's exoskeleton due to the grain.
Characteristics of the beetle
The impressively large and massive beetle reaches a body length of up to 35 millimeters. All parts of the body are robust and heavily sclerotized . The body is elongated, oval and black, but can appear lighter because of the very short, gray-brown hair ( tomentation ) and is on average a little more brown than the mourning buck.
The head is inclined downwards orthogonally to the body axis. The mouthparts point vertically downwards, the last link of the jaw probe is spindle-shaped and pointed and not truncated at an angle. The first sensor element is provided with a sickle-shaped bar in front of the end. From this point it is flattened on the inside to the point where the second feeler element deflects (Fig. 2). The third antenna segment is significantly longer in the genus than the first. As with most longhorn beetles, the second antennae is short. The remaining nine antennae elements taper increasingly towards the outside. In the female, the antennae are already longer than the body and thus longer than in the mourning buck, in the male they reach one and a half times the body length as in the mourning buck. The kidney-shaped, edged compound eyes encompass the feeler base from behind in such a way that the distance between the bases of the two feelers on the forehead is greater than the distance between the inner edges of the eyes.
The pronotum is pulled out laterally to a strong, pointed hump about halfway along. It is wrinkled and without this hump it is about the same length as it is wide, the same width as the head and narrower than the elytra .
The wing covers are fused together. At the rear end they are rounded together oval. While each wing cover in the mourning buck has two velvety black spots, these are either completely absent in Morimus asper asper or they are brownish and only stand out slightly in color. The elytra are coarse-grained over the entire surface, but smooth in the area of the spots in the weeping buck (Fig. 3). This is the defining difference between the two subspecies. The grains can be seen with the naked eye on closer inspection.
The legs are very sturdy. The fore leg has a flat longitudinal groove on the underside, which runs obliquely outwards near the tarsus . The five-limbed tarsi appear four-limbed (pseudotetrameric), since the fourth limb is very small and hidden between the lobes of the third limb. The front rails have an inclined longitudinal groove on the inside.
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| Fig. 1: Males from above | Fig. 2: First antenna segment |
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Fig. 3: Detail of the wing cover, grain size Morimus asper asper on the left , Morimus asper funereus on the right |
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Eggs
The ivory colored eggs are spindle-shaped and 4.5 millimeters long with a diameter of 1.3 millimeters. The chorion has a structure that is reminiscent of puzzle pieces that lie loosely next to each other and are only folded together in a few places. Five juxtaposed "puzzle pieces" span a distance of about 0.2 millimeters.
biology
The subspecies is less restricted in the choice of breeding trees than the weeping buck. The saproxylophage larvae develop in many different hardwoods and also in conifers . Among the hardwoods, the common beech is preferred; the conifers include larix , abies and pinus species. In northern Spain, the beetle was found at heights between ten and a thousand meters. In Greece, the beetle was caught at heights between 400 and 1200 meters during a three-year project. Individual finds are reported from heights of almost 1500 m. There is a clear preference for the altitude level in which beeches grow, while lower altitudes are preferred within the beech belt.
The adults can be found in France from May to August on the foot of felled or weakened trunks, in Spain the beetles appear in mid-April and can be found until September. They usually move at a leisurely pace.
The adults are mainly active in the evenings and at night, but it is also not uncommon for the animals to be encountered on the bright day. During the day they usually hide in cooler hiding places on the host plants, for example in cavities between the roots. When they present themselves in the evening, they like to let themselves go when they are worried. Mating and oviposition take place late in the evening or at night.
Often you can find several animals together. A possible explanation is that the males guard the females after mating in order to be able to copulate with them several times. It is also discussed that the female will attract multiple males by stridulating . Fights between males with serious damage are common, but ultimately the female chooses between applicants.
After about two weeks of maturation (bark, leaf stalks), the females are ready to mate. When males approach earlier, they are repulsed by bites and often mutilated.
Tree stumps and dead or severely weakened trees are chosen for laying eggs. Felled trunks are only accepted as long as they still have sufficient residual moisture. A study in the Eastern Pyrenees (Bosque de la Massane) found that the larvae of Morimus asper asper only appeared in dead beeches in the sixth to ninth year after the trees had died, with a maximum in the eighth year.
The female bites a shallow pit with a diameter of three to four millimeters into the bark with its strong upper jaws. Occasionally it begins before the male gives up the copulation position. The finely ground material removed is deposited on one side of the pit. Then the female turns 180 ° and feels the pit with the ovipositor . If this is too small to accommodate the egg, the female turns again to widen the pit. After the egg has been deposited, the female covers it with the wood flour deposited on the side and solidifies the flour with a secretion that is excreted from the fallopian tube. The egg now rests between the bark and the bast with the long axis of the egg parallel to the surface.
The oviposition takes place from May to September. Usually only one egg is laid per pit, about twenty to thirty in total, and the pits with the eggs can be very close together. Since the eggs are relatively large and the chamber in which the male's semen is stored is relatively small, the amount of semen ingested during mating is not sufficient to fertilize all the eggs. Multiple copulations were observed both with the same male and with different males. The advantage of greater genetic variability in polygamy appears to outweigh the disadvantage of the risk of being eaten during one of the numerous matings.
The larvae hatch after about ten days and are about five millimeters long. The destruction of the egg membrane is initiated by a tooth that sits on the outside of the mandibles and is then supported by a second "egg crusher" craneally (frontal y gular) that sits in front of the throat. The larvae feed between the bark and bast. In the course of their development, the larvae reach a length of up to eight centimeters. To pupate, they create a pupal chamber about eight centimeters long, which can lie entirely or partially in the bark (for example in the case of pines), but usually extends up to five centimeters into the sapwood. It is oriented more or less perpendicular to the surface. The puppet rest lasts eighteen to twenty days. The hatched imago remains in the pupa chamber for two to three weeks, during which the fat masses in the abdomen are broken down and the skeleton hardens. Then it leaves the breeding tree through a round loophole eight to twelve millimeters in diameter.
The development will be completed in a year, but in the laboratory the adults live up to 16 months and take not only leaves and bark, but also fruit as food. When wounded, the larvae are completely insensitive to infections .
distribution
The subspecies is restricted to Europe . It occurs mainly in northern Mediterranean and is not uncommon in Spain , southern France , Italy , Bosnia and Herzegovina , Albania and Greece . The beetle penetrates north to Switzerland and Austria , but does not reach Germany . He is also registered from Romania , Bulgaria and European Turkey . It is assumed that its current range is determined by the changing distribution of the common beech during the ice ages.
The species can be transported in wooden packaging. For example, it was found in England, but will probably not be able to survive there because the temperatures are too low.
literature
- Heinz joy, Karl Wilhelm Harde, Gustav Adolf Lohse (ed.): The beetles of Central Europe . tape 9 . Cerambycidae Chrysomelidae . Spektrum Akademischer Verlag, Munich 1999, ISBN 3-8274-0683-8 (first edition: Goecke & Evers, Krefeld 1966).
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Morimus asper asper in Fauna Europaea. Retrieved January 18, 2012
- ^ Müller, Josef (published as Müller, Giovanni) 1949: "I Coleotteri della Venezia Giulia. Catalogo ragionato, Vol. II: Coleoptera Phytophaga" Trieste Centro Sperimentale Agrario e Forestale publicazione n.4 1953, pp. 81-224 published 1950
- ^ Morimus in Fauna Europaea. Retrieved January 18, 2012
- ^ Morimus asper in Fauna Europaea. Retrieved January 18, 2012
- ↑ Morimus asper ganglbaueri at BioLib
- ↑ Species of the genus Morimus according to Reitter 1894 (PDF; 337 kB)
- ↑ Comment # 36 from Cerambycidae.net (PDF; 454 kB)
- ↑ Sigmund Schenkling: Explanation of the scientific beetle names.
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i J. Romero-Samper & P. Bahülo: "Algunas observaciones sobre la distribución y biología de Morimus asper (Sulzer, 1776) (Coleóptera: Cerambycidae) en la Península Ibérica" Boln. Asoc. esp. Enr., 17 (2): 1993: 103-122 ISSN 0210-8984 as PDF
- ↑ a b c Radosław Plewa, Krzysztof Łoś, Paweł Górski: "New data on the distribution, biology and behavior of some longhorn beetles (Coleoptera, Cerambycidae) from Greece" Elateridarium 5: 232-247, August 18, 2011 ISSN 1802-4858 as PDF
- ↑ Luc Auber: "Atlas des Coléoptères de France III" Editions N. Boubée & Cie Paris 1955 ISBN 84-7114-871-4
- ↑ Roger Dajoz "Entomologia Forestal" Ediciones Mundi-Prensa ISBN 84-7114-871-4
- ^ Find in Wales, Great Britain
