Magdalis barbicornis, (LATREILLE)

Anderson, Robert S. & Cline, Andrew R., 2011, Magdalis barbicornis (Latreille) (Coleoptera: Curculionidae: Mesoptiliinae) in California, U. S. A., The Coleopterists Bulletin 65 (1), pp. 80-81 : 80-81

MAGDALIS BARBICORNIS (LATREILLE) ( COLEOPTERA : CURCULIONIDAE : MESOPTILIINAE ) IN CALIFORNIA, U.S.A.

ROBERT S. ANDERSON Canadian Museum of Nature, PO Box 3443, Station D Ottawa, ON K1P 6P4, CANADA [e-mail]

AND

ANDREW R. CLINE Plant Pest Diagnostics Center, California Department of Food & Agriculture 3294 Meadowview Rd., Sacramento, CA 95832, U.S.A. [e-mail]

Magdalis barbicornis (Latreille) is recorded for the first time from California. Initial identification of this European weevil species in California (previously recorded from the eastern United States as early as 1909) was based on a photograph submitted to www.bugguide.net from Alameda County, which depicted the characteristic male antennal form. Additional specimens have been subsequently examined from museum collections confirming the species’ presence in California as early as 1975. Fall (1913) first recorded this species in North America from a few specimens collected in 1909 on elm in Dorchester, Massachusetts and a single specimen from Long Island, New York from the Linell Collection. Charles O’ Brien has a specimen from New Haven, Connecticut, which was the basis for the Connecticut record in his checklist (O’ Brien and Wibmer 1982) and we here have examined an additional specimen from Pennsylvania recording the species for the first time in that state.

Magdalis barbicornis is easily distinguished by males having a distinctive antennal form with the antennal club long and slender, the length of the club about the same length as the antennal funicle and scape combined. The rostrum is short and stout, the femora lack teeth, and the tarsal claws are not toothed. Females are much less distinctive than males. In April of 2010, a local California naturalist submitted a photograph of an odd weevil with a very distinctive antennal form to www. bugguide.net (see bugguide.net/node/view / 385068). One of us (RSA) examined the photograph and thought the specimen to be a male of M. barbicornis; however, at that time the species had only been recorded in North America from Connecticut, Massachusetts, and New York (Blatchley and Leng 1916; O’ Brien and Wibmer 1982). RSA contacted ARC to determine if previously collected specimens were known from California. ARC consulted the California State Collection of Arthropods (CSCA) at the Plant Pest Diagnostics Center in Sacramento and found there to be seven specimens of this species from Menlo Park in San Mateo County, California. In August, RSA examined holdings in the United States National Museum (Smithsonian Institution - USNM) and found two more specimens of the same Menlo Park series from California collected in 1975. Numerous museums in California were also contacted, including the Bohart Museum (University of California-Davis), the Essig Museum (University of California- Berkeley), the Los Angeles County Natural History Museum, the Entomology Research Museum (University of California-Riverside), the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, and the California Academy of Sciences. None of these museums possessed any other specimens of M. barbicornis from California. Likewise, the Plant Pest Diagnostics Center’ s plant pest and disease report database, which contains records of invasive pest species entering California, lacked any records of this species.

Despite some published notes indicating an association with elm (Ulmus L., Ulmaceae) (Blatchley and Leng 1916), M. barbicornis is typically associated with hawthorn (Crataegus Tourn. ex L., Rosaceae) and other members of the rose family. Hoffman (1954) indicates the following host information for the species: branches of woody arborescent Rosaceae: Crataegus spp., Prunus spinosa L., Prunus (ex cultis), Malus communis L., wild and cultivated Pyrus L., Sorbus aucuparia L., Mespilus germanica L., collected in numbers on flowers of Cotoneaster Medik. in a garden, on Spiraea billiardii Herincq. and S. hypericifolia L. The preference of this weevil for wild and cultivated members of Rosaceae may indicate a potential threat to California agriculture and natural forest ecosystems. However, 35 years have passed since the original collection of the species in California, and no significant damage by this weevil has been reported during that time period. The two records reported here from San Mateo and Alameda counties are significant and indicate the presence of the weevil in two locations around the southern region of the San Francisco Bay area.

Material examined: CA: San Mateo, Menlo Park, IV-7- 1975, Stuffeneller Collector, Cratelus [sic, for Crataegus] carrierei (1 male, 1 female USNM; 3 males, 4 females CSCA). PA: Montgomery Co., Jenkintown, 23 May 1975, Frank Stearns, Collector, taken on Pyracantha sp. (1 male USNM).