New species, new synonym, and redescription of Onthophagus (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae: Scarabaeinae) from the Western Ghats, India

Abstract

Onthophagus tnai new species, belonging to the Onthophagus militaris species group, is described from the Western Ghats, India. Characteristics of the Onthophagus militaris species group are discussed and a modified key to the group is given. A taxonomic assessment of Onthophagus species from the montane rain forest ecoregion (MEF) in the Western Ghats, resulted in the synonymy of O. taruni Biswas & Chatterjee with O.vladimiri Frey and the reassessment of the infrageneric position of O.sahai Biswas & Chatterjee.

A first faunistic account on the Onthophagus Latreille, 1802 (Coleoptera, Scarabaeidae, Scarabaeinae) of the Nadia district, West Bengal, with a preliminary checklist from India

“…Information on the occurrence of these beetles from India is chiefly based on the following works: Boucomont (1921), Arrow ( ,1933, Oppenheimer (1977), Biswas (1978Biswas ( , 1979, Biswas and Chatterjee (1985, 1986a, 1991, Sewak (1985Sewak ( , 1986Sewak ( , 1991Sewak ( , 2004aSewak ( , 2004bSewak ( , 2006Sewak ( , 2009aSewak ( , 2009bSewak ( , 2010, Scheuren (1995Scheuren ( , 1996, Biswas et al (1999), Chatterjee and Biswas (2000), Saha and Raychaudhuri (2000), Chandra (2000Chandra ( , 2002Chandra ( , 2005), Singh (2004, 2010), Chan dra and Ahirwar (2005a, 2005b, 2007), Schoolmeesters and Thomas (2006), Sarkar et al (2010Sarkar et al ( , 2015, Chandra et al (2011, Chandra and Gupta (2011a, 2011b, 2012a, 2012b, 2012e, 2013, Thomas et al (2011), Jadhav and Sharma (2012), Nithya and Thomas (2012), Anitha Rani and Sanjayan (2013), Priyadarsanan (2013, 2016), Bharamal et al (2014), Gupta et al (2014), ,…”

Some new records of scarab beetles of the genus Onthophagus Latreille, 1802 (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae) from northern Western Ghats, Maharashtra, with a checklist

“…Also, Tarasov & Kabakov (2010) and Sathiandran & Sabu (2012) stated that the taxonomic J TT errors from the Indian subcontinent are high for this genus. Moreover, the major documents like Arrow (1931) and Balthasar (1963) reporting this genus from this region are outdated (Sathiandran & Sabu 2012). Therefore, documenting diversity of this highly diverse genus will play an important role in removing the confusions and errors.…”

“…It is comprised of nearly 2,200 described species (Schoolmeesters 2016) from the world, making it a very diverse genus in the subfamily representing almost 38% of the Scarabaeinae beetles (Rossini et al 2018) with cosmopolitan distribution (Tarasov & Kabakov 2010). Approximately, 182 species have been reported from Indian mainland (Arrow 1931;Balthasar 1963;Löbl & Smetana 2006;Sathiandran & Sabu 2012). From Maharashtra, nearly 25 species are reported by Arrow (1931) and Jadhav & Sharma (2012).…”

“…The Oriental Onthophagus fauna is inadequately studied (Tarasov & Kabakov 2010). Also, Tarasov & Kabakov (2010) and Sathiandran & Sabu (2012) stated that the taxonomic J TT errors from the Indian subcontinent are high for this genus. Moreover, the major documents like Arrow (1931) and Balthasar (1963) reporting this genus from this region are outdated (Sathiandran & Sabu 2012).…”

“…The dung beetle fauna of southern Western Ghats is very well documented (Arrow 1931;Balthasar 1963Balthasar , 1974Vinod & Sabu 2007, Sabu et al 2011Sathiandran & Sabu 2012;Sathiandran et al 2015;Latha and Sabu, 2018). Sabu et al (2011) recorded about 78 species of Onthophagus from moist southern Western Ghats.…”