Published September 20, 2018 | Version v1
Taxonomic treatment Open

Copris fidius

Description

Copris fidius (Olivier, 1789)

(Fig. 3A)

Previously recorded from The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Mozambique, and South Africa (Ferreira 1972; Nguyen-Phung 1988; Davis 2013a; Deschodt et al. 2015b).

New country record for Swaziland: Ten specimens, Mbuluzi Game Reserve, 20–30 March 2016. Nocturnal. We found this species in overnight pitfall traps baited with fresh wildebeest dung, in company with Copris elphenor Klug. It was captured only during March 2016, which was a comparatively wet period compared to April 2015, when no specimens were found despite many pitfall traps being operated. The species is recorded as being “centred on forest patches, both along the eastern coastline of South Africa as far as the extreme south of Mozambique, and at higher altitude along the edge of the eastern escarpment in the north of its South African range” (Deschodt et al. 2015b). It was evaluated as belonging to the category of ‘least concern’ in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species (Davis 2013a).

Genus Copridaspidus Boucomont, 1920

This monotypic genus contains only the following species, which is rarely collected and known only from disjunct regions of moist savanna from the north and south of the Congo Basin (Davis et al. 2008).The nesting behavior of the genus remains unknown.

Notes

Published as part of Gillett, Conrad P. D. T. & Barr, Iain, 2018, New Country Records of Scarab Dung Beetles (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae: Scarabaeinae) in Swaziland and Zambia, pp. 433-438 in The Coleopterists Bulletin 72 (3) on page 436, DOI: 10.1649/0010-065X-72.3.433, http://zenodo.org/record/5383463

Files

Files (1.7 kB)

Name Size Download all
md5:8d786de9c2de10e8939e5b32c86b9abb
1.7 kB Download

System files (10.1 kB)

Name Size Download all
md5:750aec51bf4d7dd6d35eb7cf0d2c7b2d
10.1 kB Download

Linked records

Additional details

Biodiversity

Scientific name authorship
Olivier
Kingdom
Animalia
Phylum
Arthropoda
Order
Coleoptera
Family
Scarabaeidae
Genus
Copris
Species
fidius
Taxon rank
species
Taxonomic concept label
Copris fidius (Olivier, 1789) sec. Gillett & Barr, 2018

References

  • Ferreira, M. C. 1972. Os escarab'ideos de Africa (sul do Saara). I. Revista de Entomologia de Mocambique 11: 5 - 1088.
  • Nguyen-Phung, T. 1988. Revision des especes Afrotropicales du genre Copris Muller, 1764. IV. Le groupe fidius. Revue Francaise d' Entomologie 10 (1): 5 - 15.
  • Davis, A. L. V. 2013 a. Copris fidius. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2013: e. T 138095 A 536036. dx. doi. org / 10.2305 / IUCN. UK. 2013 - 2. RLTS. T 138095 A 536036. en (accessed 8 November 2017).
  • Deschodt, C. M., A. L. Davis, and C. H. Scholtz. 2015 b. A new synonymy in the fidius group of Copris Muller 1764 (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae: Scarabaeinae) and a new species from the highland grasslands of South Africa. Zootaxa, 3949 (3): 431 - 438.
  • Davis, A. L. V., A. V. Frolov, and C. H. Scholtz. 2008. The African Dung Beetle Genera. Protea Book House, Pretoria, South Africa.