Zopheridae beetles Phellopsis amurensis in the nature - photos by G.Sh. Lafer

G.Sch. Lafer, 8-IV-2002
E-mail: lafer@ibss.dvo.ru

Solitary Phellopsis in forests in southern Primorski Krai may be found apparently everywhere. I observed colonies (aggregations) of 2 or 3 dozens of beetles on one tree in the zone of dark coniferous taiga in Sikhote Alin, which includes mostly 2 kinds: spruce and fir, also birch and other deciduous kinds, on shrunk tries or high stubs with large tinders. I observed Phelopsis on one of such stubs at the end of summer for about half a month, but I did not collect beetles. Apparently Ph. amurensis is one of the series of relicts (relict cockroach Eonebria) of dark coniferous taiga of southern appearance.

Although I found colonies of these beetles, beetles were widely dispersed along the trunk and moved permanently did not sit in groups. Beetles hid in crevices of trunk or slowly moved along the bard and wood, sometimes crept from below on fruit-bodies of Poriaceae. I assume that they fed on juicy tissues of fruit-bodies of Poriaceae on their under surface.

All photographs of Phellopsis were made in the south of Sikhote Alin, on Tudagou-Suchansky watershed (now watershed of rivers Melniki and Partizanskaya) on plateau like apices (750-800 m above sea level) in the last decade of June 1973. My photographs show beetles on spruce (Picea). One beetle sits in wood crevice (its head upside).