Nettle weevil
| Nettle weevil | ||||||||||||
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Nettle weevil ( Phyllobius pomaceus ) |
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Phyllobius pomaceus | ||||||||||||
| Gyllenhal , 1834 |
The nettle weevil or green nettle weevil ( Phyllobius pomaceus , syn .: Phyllobius urticae ) is a beetle from the family weevil (Curculionidae).
features
The beetles are 7 to 10 millimeters long and have a relatively strongly arched body. It is also covered on the underside with green or blue-green, very long scales. The antennae and legs are brown, rarely red. The pronotum, which is finely structured in punctiform fashion, is constricted at the front and has a smooth longitudinal line in the middle. The wings (elytres) of the males have almost parallel margins, of the females they are wider at the back than at the front and have rows with elongated points. The wide spaces are flat. At the end of the wing cover seam , the animals have several hairs. The thighs ( femora ) of all legs have wide, pointed teeth.
The species can be distinguished from the other green weevils of the subgenus Metaphyllobius living with us by the dark hairs (interspersed between the adjacent scales) of the wing cover: This is noticeably longer in the other species, as long as the intervals in Phyllobius pilicornis , in Phyllobius glaucus and Phyllobius maculatus clearly visible at least in side view. In Phyllobius pomaceus itself it is very indistinct and only recognizable from the drop of the elytra. The other species of the subgenus live on woody plants.
Way of life
The verpuppungsbereiten Altlarven overwinter in the soil, imagines occur in the spring and are on their food crops, mainly to Great nettle ( Urtica dioica ), but also on strawberries or hemp to find. The larvae develop on the roots of nettles and other plants.
Occurrence
The species is widespread in Europe and Asia to Siberia and occurs in the north to Central Fennoscandia and is also widespread on the British Isles. The species is very common in Central Europe.
Taxonomy
The species is part of the subgenus Metaphyllobius , which includes four relatively large species in Central Europe (others live in the Caucasus ). The status and identity of the Phyllobius fessus Boheman , which is widespread from West Asia to East Central Europe , has long been controversial, today it is considered in the original version as the subspecies Phyllobius pomaceus fessus . What many authors had previously referred to as Phyllobius fessus , however, is now considered a separate species Phyllobius maculatus Tournier . The species name urticae , which was related to this species for many decades, is now considered a synonym: Curculio urticae Scopoli , 1763 is synonymous with the nettle weevil Nedyus quadrimaculatus ( Linnaeus , 1758). In the current sense, the name was introduced by De Geer in 1775, but is not available due to Scopoli's earlier use.
supporting documents
Individual evidence
- ↑ Nettle green weevil. insektenbox.de, accessed on December 9, 2013 .
- ↑ Marek Wanat: Phyllobius fessus Boheman, 1843, a new weevil species in Poland and Lithuania (Coleoptera: Curculionidae). In: Genus. Vol. 16 (4), 2005, pp. 611-617.
- ↑ a b Jiři Zahradnik, Irmgard Jung, Dieter Jung et al .: Beetles of Central and Northwestern Europe: an identification book for biologists and nature lovers . Parey, Berlin 1985, ISBN 3-490-27118-1 , pp. 82 .
- ↑ AA Legalov: Annotated checklist of species of superfamily Curculionoidea (Coleoptera) from asian part of the Russia. In: Amurian zoological journal. II (2), 2010, pp. 93-132.
- ↑ NN Yunakov, BA Korotyaev: A review of the weevil subgenus Metaphyllobius Smirnov (Coleoptera, Curculionidae, Entiminae) from Eastern Europe and Siberia. In: Entomological Review. Volume 87, Issue 8, 2007, pp. 1045-1059.
- ↑ MA Alonso-Zarazaga: The types of the palaearctic species of the families Apionidae, Rhynchitidae, Attelabidae and Curculionidae in the collection of Etienne Louis Geoffroy (Coleoptera, Curculionoidea). In: Graellsia. 64 (1), 2008, pp. 17-44.
