DOI: 10.15468/z84yqr
title: Taxonomic review of the genus Helops Fabricius, 1775 (Coleoptera: Tenebrionidae) of Turkey

description: This dataset contains the digitized treatments in Plazi based on the original journal article Nabozhenko, M. V., Keskin, B. (2017): Taxonomic review of the genus Helops Fabricius, 1775 (Coleoptera: Tenebrionidae) of Turkey. Caucasian Entomological Bulletin (Caucas. entomol. bull.) 13 (1): 41-49, DOI: 10.23885/1814-3326-2017-13-1-41-49, URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.23885/1814-3326-2017-13-1-41-49Abstract. Five species of the genus Helops s. str. Fabricius, 1775 are known from Turkey: Helops caeruleus stevenii Krynicki, 1834 (Georgia near the border of Turkey, can be found in Rize Province, Turkey), Helops rossii Germar, 1817 (Istanbul and Bursa provinces), Helops glabriventris glabriventris Reitter, 1885 (Izmir and Isparta provinces; Taurus Mts.: Mugla, Antalya, Konya, Mersin provinces), Helops cyanipes Allard, 1877 (Amanos and Central Taurus Mts.: Mersin, Kahramanmaraş, Gaziantep and Hatay provinces), Helops punctatissimus sp. n. (Bitlis Province). A new synonymy is established: Helops Fabricius, 1775 = Mesohelops Reitter, 1922, syn. n. Bionomics, morphology of male genitalia and key to the Turkish species are given.Резюме. Из Турции известно 5 виΑов роΑа Helops s. str. Fabricius, 1775: Helops caeruleus stevenii Krynicki, 1834 (Грузия, возΛе турецкой границы, может быть найΑен в провинции Ризе Турции), Helops rossii Germar, 1817 (провинции СтамбуΛ и Бурса), Helops glabriventris Reitter, 1885 (провинции Измир и Ыспарта; горы Тавр: провинции МугΛа, АнтаΛья, Конья и Мерсин), Helops cyanipes Allard, 1877 (Аманос и ЦентраΛьный Тавр: провинции Мерсин, Караманмараш, Газиантеп и Хатай), Helops punctatissimus sp. n. (провинция БитΛис). УстановΛена новая синонимия: Helops Fabricius, 1775 = Mesohelops Reitter, 1922, syn. n. ПривеΑены экоΛогия, морфоΛогия генитаΛий самца и опреΑеΛитеΛьная табΛица ΑΛя турецких виΑов.Helops s. str. Fabricius, 1775 is a small genus (the type genus of the tribe Helopini) with 6 species and 4 subspecies distributed in the Mediterranean region, Central Europe, Crimea, the Caucasus and Northern Iran [Nabozhenko, Löbl, 2008]. Helops caeruleus (Linnaeus, 1758) was conservated as the type species of the genus [Nabozhenko et al., 2008]. The greatest diversity of Helops is observed in Anatolia (4 species). Two subspecies of Helops caeruleus are known from the Caucasus and Northern Iran. Two species are distributed in Europe and 2 endemic subspecies in the Maghreb. American species of the genus Helops must be transferred to the other genera of the tribe Helopini after an accurate revision; the genus Helops is a polyphyletic group with the inclusion of the New World species [Nabozhenko et al., 2016b].The genus Helops is very broadly defined until the 20th century. It included almost all known Helopini without subgeneric division [Küster, 1850, 1851] or with multiple subgenera and sections [Laporte, 1840; Seidlitz, 1896]. Allard [1876, 1877] included to the genus species of Helops and Probaticus Seidlitz, 1896 sensu Reitter [1922]. The last revision was made by Reitter [1922] who reduced the genus to 7 species and 1 subspecies and synonymized the genus Anteros Laporte, 1840 with Helops. The Reitter’s system of Palaearctic Helops was supported by other entomologists and it is used to the present time. Reitter [1922] also described the subgenus Mesohelops Reitter, 1922 with two species: Helops cyanipes Allard, 1877 and H. valdani Guérin-Méneville, 1859. Later Grimm [1991] added Helops thoracicus Grimm, 1991 to the subgenus. Helops valdani belongs to the genus Probaticus Seidlitz, 1896 (the subgenus Pelorinus Vauloger de Beaupré, 1900) [Nabozhenko, Löbl, 2008]. Differential characters used by Reitter for Mesohelops are doubtful for a subgeneric level: punctation of elytra, lesser size of elevated protrusion on mentum, colour of cuticule. First two characters are sutable only for interspecies diagnostics, and colour of Helops (Mesohelops) cyanipes is very variable from black to blue. All characters of two species of the subgenus Mesohelops are identical to the nominatypical subgenus. As a result, the following synonymy is established: Helops Fabricius, 1775 = Mesohelops Reitter, 1922, syn. n.Further species of Helops with images of genitalia and keys were revised in the taxonomic works of Antoine [1949] and Español [1963] for Maghreb and Ardoine [1958] for France. Bogatchev [1949] described a new subspecies Helops caeruleus talyshensis from Hyrcan forests of South Precaspian region. Picka [1984] added one new subspecies of Helops glabriventris Reitter, 1885 from Crete (Greece). Grimm [1991] described a new species from Cyprus. Taxonomic review of Caucasian and Iranian Helops was made by Abdurakhmanov and Nabozhenko [2011]. Larvae and pupae are known (excluding old work with noninformative figures and descriptions) for Helops caeruleus stevenii Krynicki, 1834 [Byzova, Gilyarov, 1956; Cherney, 2005] and Helops insignis maroccanus Fairmaire, 1873 [Pardo Alcaide, 1942].The Middle East species of the genus Helops are poorly studied. In addition to the above-mentioned works only some faunistic records were published by Koch [1935] and Finkel at al. [2002] for Israel and by Kaszab [1968], Ferrer and Soldati [1999] for Turkey.Bionomics of species of the genus Helops is well studied only for H. caeruleus и H. rossi Germar, 1817 (see bibliography in Gebien [1943], Hellrigl et al. [2012] etc.). All species of Helops s. str. are lichenophagous beetles and feed on epiphytic foliose and fruticose lichens. Beetles are active at night. Species of Helops hide in the daytime in mouldering wood, under the flacking bark of large old trees or stumps, while many other Helopini hide in the daytime in soil under trees. Larvae and pupae also develope in mouldering wood [Byzova, Gilyarov, 1956]. Within Palaearctic Helopini only larvae of some species of Deretus Gahan, 1900 [Purchart, Nabozhenko, 2012] and Allardius Ragusa, 1898 [Bellavista, Sparacio, 2012] develope in mouldering trees, while the most of other species of the tribe have soil-dwelling larvae [Nabozhenko at al., 2016a]. In Turkey two species, Helops caeruleus and H. rossii, are distributed in low mountain and plain oak forests, and the species H. cyanipes and H. glabriventris inhabit coniferous forests. Helops cyanipes occurs on old mouldering Pinus nigra and Cedrus libani; H. glabriventris can be found on Abies cilicica, rarely on old Juniperus excelsa. Maghreb species Helops insignis Lucas, 1846 inhabits Cedrus atlantica и Abies maroccana.Below we describe a new species of the genus Helops s. str. from South Eastern Anatolia which was found in woodland of old Juniperus excelsa.