Neomida haemorrhoidalis (Fabricius, 1787)
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POLYPHAGA Emery, 1886
TENEBRIONOIDEA Latreille, 1802
Neomida Latreille, 1829
This widespread Palaearctic species occurs throughout temperate Asia to the far east of Russia and Japan, it extends south through Asia Minor to Iran and is known from many of the Mediterranean islands but the European distribution is patchy; it is locally common from Spain to Northern Italy, parts of the Balkans and Greece in the south, and less so further north to Denmark and some southern provinces of Fennoscandia, it is absent from some central regions and seems to have declined drastically over recent decades across much of the north. It does not occur in the UK. In Europe it is considered a relict species of old established deciduous woodland with very specific requirements regarding the amount and quality of decaying wood and the continuity of fungi, they are therefore more or less restricted to areas of primeval forest although populations sometimes occur in isolated groups of trees in urban situations and conifers in a suitable state of decay sometimes host them. Adults are present year-round, they overwinter in decaying wood or sporophores and are active over a long season through the spring and summer, they are nocturnal and usually occur on decaying fungoid trees. Larvae develop through the summer within sporophores or in wood infested with hyphae, among the most frequent hosts are Fomes fomentarius (L.) Fr. and Ganoderma applanatum (Pers.) Pat., less often in Phellinus nigricans (Fr.) Karst, and Fomitopsis pinicola (Sw.) Karst (on various conifers) and occasionally other species. Pupae have been found in the autumn and winter within old sporophores and in associated decaying wood and teneral adults occur in spring and autumn, suggesting that larval development is completed by the autumn. Adults most often occur on birches (Betula L.), poplars (Populus L.), oaks (Quercus L.) and beech (Fagus L.), they generally occur in numbers and usually among populations of other saproxylic species, especially Mycetophagus quadripustulatus (L.) and Bolitophagus reticulatus (L.) but also many others.
5.5-7.5 mm. Elongate, convex and glabrous and shiny, forebody and appendages reddish-brown, elytra black or dark blue. Head transverse with small, widely transverse eyes and long temples, surface finely punctured and microsculptured throughout, anteriorly rounded and weakly emarginate before the eyes, clypeus with yellow setae anteriorly. Terminal maxillary palpomere cylindrical. Antennae short and robust, 11-segmented with segments 5-10 transverse. Pronotum transverse, broadest behind the middle and evenly curved to obtuse posterior angles and almost rounded anterior angles, lateral and basal margins bordered, surface finely punctured and microsculptured throughout and with a distinct fovea either side of the disc in the basal half. Scutellum triangular with rounded sides, reddish-brown and microsculptured as the pronotum. Elytra almost parallel-sided from rounded shoulders to a continuous apical margin, striae strongly punctured to the apex, interstices much broader than striae; weakly convex and finely and randomly punctured throughout. Legs short and slender, femora simple, tibiae with a very fine spur at the inner apical angle. Tarsi 5-5-4 in both sexes, basal segments short and weakly bilobed, terminal segment long and gradually widened to the apex, claws with a small basal tooth. Strongly sexually dimorphic; males have a large erect horn beside each eye, a deep fovea on the vertex and two small but distinct tubercles which are visible on the anterior clypeal margin.