Further taxonomic differentiation in the quadrispinosa complex of Dicraspeda Chaudoir in the Papuan Region and additional records of the genus (Coleoptera: Carabidae: Odacanthinae).

Abstract

The peculiar odacanthine species Dicraspeda quadrispinosa Chaudoir, 1869 is composed of several quite distinct populations which provisionally were described as subspecies (Baehr 2006a). The species ranges from Halmahera in the north-west, through New Guinea and New Britain, to the Solomon Islands in the south-east. From the latter island group, however, the species was so far reliably recorded only from Bougainville Island. The species belongs to the quite diverse Indo-Australian genus Dicraspeda Chaudoir, 1862 which occupies a large range that extends from southern mainland Asia through the Indonesian and Philippine insular belts, the Papuan subregion, into northern and eastern Australia. Within the genus, D. quadrispinosa is distinguished by large size, glossy black colour, and quadrispinose elytra whose spines are remarkably elongate when compared with other species of the genus. Baehr (2006a) examined a large number of specimens throughout the species’ range and described three subspecies: moluccensis from Halmahera, novabritannica from New Britain, and brevipennis from Bougainville Island in the Solomon Islands, while the specimens from New Guinea belong to the nominate subspecies. During a recent visit at National Museum of Natural History Naturalis in Leiden and while examining a collection of New Guinean carabid beetles from the Zoological Museum of the University of Amsterdam, I sorted out a number of specimens of D. quadrispinosa from various localities throughout its range which turned out to be quite different in their external and genitalic morphology and thus herein are described as additional new subspecies. The material includes in particular specimens from a number of islands of the Solomon Archipelago which exhibit strikingly different morphological character states Further taxonomic differentiation in the quadrispinosa complex of Dicraspeda Chaudoir in the Papuan Region and additional records of the genus (Coleoptera: Carabidae: Odacanthinae)