British Insects: the Families of Coleoptera
British Insects: the Families of Coleoptera |
|
Including Attalomimidae, Carphuridae, Dasytidae, Gietellidae, Malachiidae, Rhadalidae.
General appearance. 1.4–8 mm long. Body length/maximum body width 1.5–5.55. Elytral length/pronotal length 0.55–5.45. Base of prothorax not or scarcely narrower than the combined elytral bases, or distinctly narrower than the combined elytral bases. Greatest prothoracic width not narrower or only slightly narrower than the greatest elytral width, or distinctly narrower than greatest elytral width. Beetles elongate to slender; dorsally flattened; conspicuously necked to not necked; somewhat waisted to conspicuously waisted; without ‘warning colouration’. Upper surfaces of body glabrous or subglabrous, or non-glabrous; exhibiting stiff, erect, dark bristles, or not bristly; with neither scales nor scale-like setae.
Detailed morphology. Eyes strongly protuberant, or not strongly protuberant; bristly, or without bristles. Antennae short to about half the insect's head to tail length; 9–11 segmented. Antennal scape swollen, or not swollen. Antennae filiform, or serrate. Antennal insertions visible from above. Mandibular prosthecae well developed to absent.
Prothorax shorter than wide, or about as long as wide. Pronotal length/maximum pronotal width 0.55–1.52. Prothorax at its widest markedly narrower than the adjoining part of the abdomen, or not markedly narrower than the adjoining part of the abdomen. Prothorax without notopleural sutures. Metaventrite without a transverse groove. The tarsi without bilobed segments; with a tiny penultimate segment hidden by lobing of the one proximal to it, or without ‘hidden’ segments. Mid-leg tarsi 4-segmented, or 5-segmented; pentamerous, or pseudotetramerous, or tetramerous. Claws of the mid-leg tarsi with an appendage, or not appendaged; the appendages when present, not or only lightly sclerotized. Front tarsi with as many segments as the mid-tarsi, or with one segment fewer than the mid-tarsi; 4-segmented, or 5-segmented. Hind tarsi with as many segments as the mid-tarsi; 4-segmented, or 5-segmented. Tarsal claws simple, or one-toothed or bifid (toothed or with a fleshy appendage beneath). Elytral length/maximum width across the elytra 0.48–4.4. Elytra meeting along the length of the mid-line; covering most of the abdomen, or short, exposing several terminal abdominal tergites; exposing no more than part of the terminal tergite to at least three complete abdominal tergites; rather soft; smooth; without striae. Scutellary striole absent. Wings well developed, or absent or much reduced.
Visible abdominal sternites 5–7; immovably joined 0, or 2. Abdominal segment 8 apparently without functional spiracles.
Habitat, ecology. Land-dwellers; predacious; in living vegetation (often on flowers).
Larvae. Larvae predacious (?); in rotting wood, or in or under bark.
Classification. Suborder Polyphaga; Superfamily Cleroidea.
British representation. Genera 10; 22 species. E.g., Malachius marginellus (Spined Soft-beetle).
Illustrations. • Malachius marginellus (Spined Soft-beetle: B. Ent. 167). • Malachius marginellus: B. Ent. 167, legend+text. • Malachius marginellus: B. Ent. 167, text cont..
To view the illustrations with detailed captions, go to the interactive key. This also offers full and partial descriptions, diagnostic descriptions, differences and similarities between taxa, lists of taxa exhibiting or lacking specified attributes, and distributions of character states within any set of taxa.
Cite this publication as: ‘Watson, L., and Dallwitz, M.J. 2003 onwards. British insects: the families of Coleoptera. Version: 18th September 2008. http://delta-intkey.com’.
