Canthidium muticum ( Boheman, 1858 )

Cupello, Mario, 2018, On the types species of the New World dung beetle genus Canthidium Erichson, 1847 (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae: Scarabaeinae), with an annotated checklist of species, Zootaxa 4388 (4), pp. 451-486 : 476

Canthidium muticum ( Boheman, 1858)

Onthophagus muticus Boheman, 1858: 48 [transferred to Canthidium by Harold 1867b: 88]. Type locality: Unknown (originally cited as “Insula Oahu (Honolulu)”). Type material: According to Harold (1867b), only one syntype was found (NHRS). Distribution: Supposedly from the island of O‘ahu, in the Hawaiian archipelago, in the middle of northen Pacific ocean. According to Bousquet (2016), the material studied by Boheman (1858) was collected during the circumnavigation expedition of the Swedish frigate HSwMS Eugenie between 1851 and 1853 under command of Christian Adolf Virgin (1797–1870). During that voyage, the crew set foot in several locations all around the world, including South America and Panama, where most of the Canthidium species live, and in Hawaii, where the C. muticum type series was supposedly collected at. Therefore, it is possible that some beetles collected in the Neotropics were mingled with others caught in the Hawaiian archipelago, so leading to a possible mislabelling of some specimens. It is necessary to revise the type series to check whether this is either an incorrect geographical report, or whether C. muticum is indeed a Hawaiian endemic. It is noteworthy that, along with from C. muticum , the only other dung beetle described by Boheman (1858) from Honolulu, Canthon balteatus , had its occurrence in the archipelago questioned earlier in the Nishida (2002) survey of the Hawaiian arthropods. According to Vulcano & Pereira (1964), C. balteatus is endemic to Ecuador. Liebherr et al. (2010) discussed on several cases of South American Carabidae allegedly described from Hawaii by Boheman (1858).