Lomechusa paradoxa Gravenhorst, 1806

Harrison, Tom & Lapeva-Gjonova, Albena, 2014, Two Lomechusini (Coleoptera: Staphylinidae: Aleocharinae) species new to Bulgaria, ZooNotes 2014 (66), pp. 1-2 : 2

Lomechusa paradoxa Gravenhorst, 1806

Strandzha Mt. , Malko Tarnovo, N41.986826 E27.520416, 326 m alt., 18 April 2010, 1 female from a nest of Formica cunicularia Latreille, 1798 , leg. A. Lapeva-Gjonova.

The nest was located under a stone in an area of grassy karst. The beetle was found together with two dealated queens and workers; samples of the queens and workers were also collected.

The ants of the genus Formica are host for both of the above listed beetle species. Lomechusoides strumosus is usually found with several Formica species and less frequently in Myrmica nests. In the case of Lomechusa paradoxa a characteristic seasonal change of hosts occurs; the beetle wintering with Myrmica and spending the summer with Formica spp. and accidentally with Lasius ( Assing 2009) . Formica cunicularia is rarely reported as the host of Lomechusa paradoxa .

Both species have a wide distribution in Europe; the range of Lomechusa paradoxa is known to extend to the Caucasus while Lomechusoides strumosus reaches the Far East and Kazakhstan ( Hlaváč et al. 2011). Thus, these two recent finds in Bulgaria are not unexpected but they do indicate the need for more fieldwork to be carried out on this subtribe. This new data increases the number of reported myrmecophilous Lomechusini species for the country to 15.