Abstract

PARDO-LOCARNO, Luis Carlos  and  SCHOOLMEESTERS, Paul. SMALL DUNG BEETLES OF COLOMBIA (Coleoptera Scarabaeoidea Aphodiinae) I: PRELIMINARY CATALOG AND KEY FOR REGISTERED SPECIES. Bol. Cient. Mus. Hist. Nat. Univ. Caldas [online]. 2019, vol.23, n.1, pp.279-302. ISSN 0123-3068.  https://doi.org/10.17151/bccm.2019.23.1.13.

The Small Dung Beetles (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae: Aphodiinae), mostly saprophagous habits, are a group of wide global distribution, relatively diverse in the tropics, although they are little known and studied for their cryptic habits and complex taxonomy. Given the above and with a view to promoting its study, this research was proposed, inventory the Colombian species and provide taxonomic keys of the records found in the literature of the group. For the first case (catalog), multiple bibliographic sources were consulted, to a lesser degree some species and records were studied in the collection of the first author (Colección Familia Pardo-Locarno-CFPL-COL). Followed by the above, a taxonomic key was elaborated. The results covered 20 genera and 56 species of Aphodiinae for Colombia, providing a key at the level of tribes, genera and species. These results allow us to infer that the group could be poorly sampled and, therefore, be much more diverse than what is noted here, it is also expected that new studies will specify the distribution maps of the species, which are now very fragmentary.

Keywords : Saprophagous beetles; tropical habitats; inventory; taxonomic keys.

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