NOTES ON THE SUFFOLK LIST OF COLEOPTERA
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NOTES ON THE SUFFOLK LIST OF COLEOPTERA: 12 TWENTY-SEVEN SPECIES NEW TO THE SUFFOLK LIST WITH SIGNIFICANT RECORDS FROM THE YEAR 2004 DAVID R. NASH This paper discusses twenty-seven species of beetle which should be considered “New to Suffolk” for the Index to these Transactions; these species are asterisked. Noteworthy records from 2004 are also reported. All records are my own except where indicated. As in previous papers in this series, records are allocated to vice-county (VC25, East; VC26, West) and National Grid references are provided, with those assigned by me to old records being placed in square brackets. The national status for scarce and threatened species is given, following Hyman (1992; 1994); an explanation of these categories is provided in a previous paper in this series (Nash, 2003). The national status assigned in early versions of English Nature’s “Recorder” database is provided for all other species. Unless specifically mentioned, there are no Suffolk specimens of any of the species discussed in the Claude Morley/Chester Doughty collection at Ipswich Museum (in the following account simply referred to as the Morley Collection). CARABIDAE All references to Luff in the following species’ accounts refer to Luff’s “Atlas” (1998). *Bembidion octomaculatum (Goeze) RDB1 and BAP This little ground beetle which occurs at the margin of fresh, still, waters was presumed extinct in this country until it was re-discovered by a reservoir in East Sussex (Jones, 1992). It has been found in other south-eastern localities since that time and Luff considers the current populations are the result of recent immigration from the continent. I have the following records: 31 May 2003, Cornard Mere VC26 (TL8838) (P. Harvey det. P. Hammond). 22 May 2004, 2 in flooded section of old moat, Cornard Mere S.W. T. Reserve VC 26 (TL8939) (M. Telfer) *Anisodactylus poeciloides (Stephens) RDB3 & BAP This rare ground beetle is shown in Luff (1998) to have a distribution confined to the south and south eastern coasts of Britain with the handful of recent records coming from the Thames estuary. Following its BAP designation (Anon, 1999), extensive surveys have shown that the beetle has been underrecorded (especially round the Thames estuary) and it has now been recorded from 18 sites since 1995 (Middlebrook, 2004). The survey has also discovered that the species, whilst restricted to saline habitats, is not strictly speaking a saltmarsh species and is not generally found close to the sea or areas of regular inundation. Its preferred habitat appears to be areas of bare ground with a growth of early successional halophyte plants such as Glasswort (Salicornia). Such conditions typically occur along gently sloping margins of saline lagoons or brackish ditches and in saline hollows on grazing marshes.
Trans. Suffolk Nat. Soc. 41 (2005)