Phloeotribus scarabaeoides (Bernard, 1788)

Beaver, Roger A., Ghahari, Hassan & Sanguansub, Sunisa, 2016, An annotated checklist of Platypodinae and Scolytinae (Coleoptera: Curculionidae) from Iran, Zootaxa 4098 (3), pp. 401-441 : 416-417

Phloeotribus scarabaeoides (Bernard, 1788)

Distribution in Iran. Ardabil ( Samin et al. 2011), Guilan and northern and central provinces ( Modarres Awal 1997).

General distribution. Southern Europe, North Africa, Middle East.

Biology. Recorded in Iran from Fraxinus excelsior , Syringa sp. and Olea europea (Oleaceae) ( Modarres Awal 1997), and from Pinus nigra (Pinaceae) ( Samin et al. 2011). This is a pest of olive ( Olea europaea ) in the Mediterranean region, and was the subject of a major study of its morphology, biology and natural enemies by Russo (1937, 1939). More recently its biology, parasitoids, population dynamics and control measures have been studied in Spain by Campos, Lozano and colleagues (e.g. Gonzalez & Campos 1995; Lozano et al. 1996a, b; Rodriguez et al. 2003). As noted above, it also attacks other genera of Oleaceae ( Fraxinus , Syringa ), but the discovery of three specimens on a conifer ( Pinus nigra ) ( Samin et al. 2011) is surprising. Phloeotribus spinulosus (Rey) is the only species in the genus known to attack conifers in the Palaearctic region ( Wood & Bright 1992), and a misidentification is possible.