Partial inventory of the insect species introduced in Puerto Rico from 1980 to 2015

Abstract

The development of a biological inventory is a common tool in biodiversity and conservation studies. There is some information related to a biological inventory in Puerto Rico compiled from academic journals and regulatory agencies; however, there is no document that contains all the information. Accordingly, we reviewed literature and documents regarding introduced insects over a period of 35 years, from 1980 to 2015; however, there is still data to be collected and corroborated. For each species, we describe the classification, distribution by hosts, taxa and detection date. Included as introduced species are insects detected on the island, whether introduced deliberately, accidentally or by natural phenomena. Official sources of information were used to complement the data from our inventory. The fundamental purpose of the study is to establish the presence of species of the insect fauna listed by state and federal agencies, and to describe, in an integral way, the composition of biotic elements. Among the most relevant data found is the fact that most of the introduced insect species are from the orders Hemiptera, Thysanoptera, Coleoptera, Diptera and Hymenoptera. The order Hemiptera was the most prevalent in this study, with 12 families represented. Another significant finding is that the largest number of insect species was introduced into the island in the years 2006, 2008, 2010 and 2012.