Eulasia pietschmanni Breit, 1920

Uliana, Marco & Sabatinelli, Guido, 2013, Eulasia (Rudeulasia) daccordii, a new species from southern Levant, with notes on E. pietschmanni Breit and E. baumanni Mitter (Coleoptera: Scarabaeoidea: Glaphyridae), Zootaxa 3702 (2), pp. 124-134 : 130-133

Eulasia pietschmanni Breit, 1920

Material examined. 49♂, 36♀.

Type series: [ Iraq] “Bagdadi, am Euphrat”, 10.IV.1910, Mesopot. Exp. Nat. O. V. 1910 (2♂, 1♀, bearing label “ Type ”) (NHMW).

Other specimens: Syria: Syria, 41 KM E Hama, NE Salamiyah, 35°08’N, 37°12’E, m 503, 7.V.2009, Leg. G. Sabatinelli & M. Uliana (31♂, 21♀) (GS, MU). Syria, Khirbat Duwayzin, about 100 Km NW Palmyra, 35°03’N, 37°28’E, m 680, 7.V.2009, leg G. Sabatinelli & M. Uliana (1♂ 4 ♀) (GS, MU). Syria, 76 Km NW Palmyra, 34°57’N 37°35’E 866m, 7.V.2009, leg. G. Sabatinelli & M. Uliana (4♂, 3♀) (GS, MU). Syria, Palmyra, 17.IV.2003. leg P. Weill (1♀) (DK). Syria, Tel Alnaqa, 34°36’N, 36°58’E, m. 770, 3.V.2009., leg. G. Sabatinelli & M. Uliana (3♂, 3♀) (MU). Syria, 40km South Homs, 993m, 34°19’N 36°45’E, 17.IV.2010, leg. G. Sabatinelli (5♂, 2♀). Jordan: Jordan, between wadi Hafir and wadi Rabigh, env. Wadi Rum (Ma'an), m 1000, 24.III.1994, Leg. F. Fabianol (3♂, 1♀) (PL, MU).

Distribution. Syria, Iraq, Jordan ( Fig. 14 ). Chikatunov and Pavlicek (1997) mentioned this species also from Israel, citing as a sources of distributional data Baraud (1990) (actually, not mentioning its presence in Israel) and “Petrovitz (1972)”, a reference not cited in their work. We were unable to find any published record for E. pietschmanni in Israel, although specimens of E. daccordii have been misidentified as E. pietschmanni by Petrovitz in 1974 ( TAU). In spite of its presence in Petra ( Jordan), this species was not collected in southern Israel, where its sister species E. daccordii is recorded. In this case it appears that Jordan Valley represent the eastern limit to E. daccordii distribution.

Ecological remarks. This species is widely distributed but rather uncommon, although notable densities of individuals can concentrate on small areas. We found it associated to steppe-like, partly cultivated, to subdesertlike landscapes ( Fig. 17), where we exclusively collected it within red flowers of Papaveraceae . Its apparently scattered distribution and the difficulty of sampling are probably strongly influenced by scarcity and unpredictability of blossoms due to poor and irregular precipitations.

Taxonomic and nomenclatorial remarks. We have to note that the identification key and the discussion by Baraud (1990) are partly misleading, since the author based the diagnose of E. pietschmanni also on the putative green colour of its head and pronotum. According to the examined material, the colour of E. pietschmanni ranges most commonly from magenta to purple; the type series, described as “düster kupfrig” (dark copper), is actually dull magenta and corresponds well to the material we examined. The chromatic variation of the head and pronotum is generally not much different from the most frequent magenta-purple forms, and consists in lighter colour (with golden shades) or dull, dark, greyish-purple, often with strong cyan shades; we observed a single remarkable polychromous specimen with bright green head and border of pronotum and pronotal disc magenta.

Therefore, the chromatic aspect alone is normally discriminative between E. pietschmanni and E. genei , the latter being most commonly green or golden green (Uliana & Sabatinelli 2010), with copper or red forms existing but still quite distant from the usual magenta of E. pietschmanni . Apart from the well-differentiated parameres, these two species can be easily recognized also by the shape of elytra at the apex (the external margin more convex than the internal and presence of a flat or depressed apical area in E. genei , symmetrical and regularly convex in E. pietschmanni ) as mentioned by Baraud (1990), and by the shape of the pronotum in males (rounded, with base slightly larger than the anterior border in E. genei ; trapezoidal, with base much wider than the anterior border in E. pietschmanni ).

The description year of Eulasia pietschmanni Breit is 1920 and not 1919, as stated in the recent literature, including in the Catalogue of Palearctic Coleoptera (Nikodým & Bezdek 2006: 99) where the year is correctly given as 1920 in the references. The year of publication is clearly indicated as 1920 both in the frontispiece and in the summary pages of the volume containing Breit’s original description (Breit 1920).

On the identity of Eulasia baumanni Mitter, 1996

Since E. daccordii was collected also in the type locality of the poorly known E. baumanni Mitter , we paid particular attention to the latter taxon while ascertaining the identity of the Rudeulasia specimens examined.

The original description was based on a single female (Mitter 1996), and subsequently a second female specimen was recorded by Mitter (2008). Unfortunately, the author, who keeps the holotype in his personal collection, did not agree to loan us this specimen for study (personal communication to MU, 2008, and to GS, 2012). Therefore, we are forced to base our evaluation only on the second specimen, which we received from the Oxford University Museum of Natural History. Since this specimen was identified by Mitter himself and is consistent with the original description, we confidently consider its identity matching that of the holotype.

According to this specimen, Eulasia baumanni has to be referred to the populations usually identified in collections as E. papaveris (Sturm) , whose occurrence in the Levant is widespread and well known. During our field research we collected specimens matching this taxon in several localities from northern Syria to Israel, including places very close to the type locality of E. baumanni . The variability of these populations is noteworthy and apparently not showing a clear-cut disjunct distribution. It concerns both morphology (including variation in the density of pronotal punctures) and colour, since we observed phenotypes with the head and pronotum varying from magenta to green and to grey-violet, with or without elytral sheen.

Considering the above-mentioned variability, the diagnostic characters indicated by Mitter (1996) for E. baumanni appears to be unreliable and, in spite of our efforts, E. baumanni , is still an obscure taxon. Since any nomenclatorial proposal would be unwarranted, we maintain E. baumanni as a valid name, although its application to specimens and populations is presently undefinable.

In general, our preliminary analysis of the different populations and taxa belonging to E. papaveris complex shows today an unsatisfactory taxonomic situation. We are therefore planning to revise this group, that includes the strongly similar taxa E. harmonia (Petrovitz, 1968) and E. rapillyi (Baraud, 1988) , based on the large material recently collected in the Levant and Turkey and combining morphology with molecular techniques.

Figures

FIGURE 14. Species distribution according to examined specimens: E. pietschmanni (yellow circles) and E. daccordii (red circles). Inset showing detailed distribution of the latter. Urban areas in grey.