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Photo#1898248
Calleida rubricollis? - Calleida rubricollis

Calleida rubricollis? - Calleida rubricollis
Upper Key Largo, Monroe County, Florida, USA
June 24, 2017
Beaten from tree in mangrove. Peter Messer and I believe this to be Calleida rubricollis, which would be a new U.S. record. We would like opinions for or against.

Saved under "Calleida rubricollis Dejean"
according to the discussion below.

Proposal for Calleida rubricollis Dejean 1825: 225, USA rec. n.
Compare to databased images of C. rubricollis from Dominican Republic and Cuba here.

Translation of Dejean's (1825) description of C. rubricollis:
"Bright green; pronotum, antennae, tibiae to tarsi rufous. Length 3 ¼ lines [= 6.88 mm]. It looks a lot like the C. decora, but it is a little smaller. The head is the color of the elytra. Antennas are almost entirely ferruginous with the extremity only a little obscure. The pronotum is a little shorter, more broad, more convex and smoother. The streaks of the elytra are less marked, and they are on the contrary a little more strongly punctuated. The intervals are smoother. We also notice the two points inserted between the second and the third streak, but the first is closer to the base. Below, the chest and the abdomen are darker green than the elytra. The thighs (femur) are the same color; their origin, the legs and tarsi are red-ferruginous. It is found in North America."

Bousquet 2012: 1617–1618 said the following:
Calleida rubricollis Dejean, 1825: 225. Type locality given as “Amérique septentrionale.”Dejean (1831: 328) acknowledged receiving specimens of this species from Cuba, including some from Klug under the name elegans, which did not differ from his specimens of C. rubricollis. Chaudoir (1844: 469) described Calleida elegans (which he credited to Klug) by pointing out structural differences between his sole specimen and those of C.rubricollis. Later Chaudoir (1873b: 144) concluded that the differences reported in 1844 between the specimens from the United States and Cuba were only “accidental” and that all the specimens belonged to the same species. I have seen a specimen from Chaudoir’s collection in MHNP labeled “rubricollis mihi elegans [illegible letters] in Ins. Cuba D. Klug [handwritten] / Lectotype ♂ Calleida rubricollis Dej. by Erwin ‘76 [partly handwritten].” The specimen is probably one received from Klug and noticed in 1831 by Dejean and therefore is likely not a syntype. Based on the original description by Dejean (1825: 225) and this specimen, I believe that C. rubricollis is structurally most similar to C. decora (Fabricius) among the North American species but specifically distinct. I have not seen a conspecific specimen from North America and believe the type locality listed by Dejean (i.e., Amérique septentrionale) is in error. The statement by Chaudoir (1873b: 144) that the specimens from United States were identical with those from Cuba may be based on a comparison of his Cuban specimens with those of Dejean, which he believed came from the United States. At the time, Chaudoir owned Dejean’s carabid collection. Already in his first catalogue, LeConte (1863b: 6) stated that “C. rubricollis Dej. is not found within the present limits of the United States, but is confined to Cuba.”

PWM notes: I believe the important features for C. rubricollis displayed by Kyle's specimen are femora uniformly dark, rest of legs rufous like pronotum & antennae; intervals flattish, stria distinctly punctulate; eyes probably not as markedly convex as in decora which also has femora colored differently. C. caymanensis I noticed has legs uniformly dark and intervals distinctly convex. In rubricollis the elytral color likely varies in the green to blue spectrum similar to the intraspecific luster variations seen in other beetle species. It helps to know that there are only 6 species of West Indian Calleida according to Erwin & Sims 1984: 446 in Quaestiones Entomologicae. Yours can’t be C. decolor and C. bahamensis because those two are brownish color. Considering the coloration and flat intervals, I think C. rubricollis Dejean = syn. C. elegans Chaudoir is the best fit. Erwin & Sims assigned rubricollis to Cuba and “?USA”. It’s sad that Terry Erwin and Michael Thomas are no longer around to help with the species identification of this specimen.

Kyle and I welcome opinions for or against C. rubricollis. It is provisionally registered at New Records & Taxonomic Treatments of Geadephaga as a new USA record.

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