Morphological separation of Tomicus piniperda and T. destruens (Coleoptera: Curculionidae: Scolytinae): new and old characters

Abstract

Abstract. Tomicus piniperda and T. destruens are sibling species which are extremely difficult to separate by morphological characters. Although several papers report differences between the two species, many characters need confirmation or better description. Moreover, new morphological characters are required for correct species determination. For these purposes, eight populations of T. destruens from Italy, Greece, Spain and Algeria, and ten of T. piniperda from Finland, Poland, Czech Republic, Austria, Sweden and Italy, were investigated considering eleven morphological characters. The morphological differences most useful for the species separation include four previously described characters (colour of the elytra, colour of the antennal club, distribution of the antennal setae, distribution of the punctures along the elytral declivity), and four new characters (body proportions, setation of the first antennal club suture, sculpture of the elytral declivity and striae density of the pars stridens). Distribution of the two species is discussed and an illustrated key is included.

Two Species withinDendroctonus frontalis(Coleoptera: Curculionidae): Evidence from Morphological, Karyological, Molecular, and Crossing Studies

“…In other cases of sibling species in the genus and in other scolytines, quantitative measures have sometimes been used for species separation. Examples include pronotal width in Dendroctonus ponderosae Hopkins and Dendroctonus jeffreyi Hopkins (Lanier and Wood 1968) and in species within the frontalis complex (Lanier et al 1988), relative length of abdominal sternites in Dendroctonus valens Le-Conte and Dendroctonus terebrans Olivier (Pajares and Lanier 1990), and Þve different continuous char- acters in Tomicus destruens and Tomicus piniperda (L.) (Faccoli 2006).…”

The pine shoot beetle Tomicus piniperda as a plausible vector of Fusarium circinatum in northern Spain

“…Molecular identification of insects was carried out, because of the possible sympatry between T. piniperda and Tomicus destruens in the study area (Gallego et al 2004) and because of the complexity of identifying some morphological characters or even their absence in some individuals (Faccoli 2006). For this purpose, the DNA was extracted from nine randomly selected insects, with the Biotools extraction kit (Speedtools Tissue DNA Extraction Kit).…”

Sydowia polyspora Dominates Fungal Communities Carried by Two Tomicus Species in Pine Plantations Threatened by Fusarium circinatum

“…piniperda and T. destruens share a very similar morphology [22]. Therefore, molecular identification by PCR was carried out with extracted DNA from all the collected insects according to Vainio et al [23].…”