Atylotus agrestis ( Wiedemann, 1828 )

Müller, Günter C., Prozorov, Alexey M., Traore, Mohamed M., Revay, Edita E., Hogsette, Jerome A., Kline, Daniel, Chaskopoulou, Alexandra, Prozorova, Tatiana A., Volkova, Julia S., Diarra, Rabiatou A., Petrányi, Gergely, Schneider, Tom, Beck, Robert H. - T., Ignatev, Nikolai, Yakovlev, Roman V., Cui, Liwang & Schlein, Yosef, 2023, The Tabanidae (Diptera) of the Greek islands and Cyprus: An annotated checklist with remarks on ecology, zoogeography, and new records on the East Mediterranean fauna, Ecologica Montenegrina 67, pp. 45-65 : 49-50

8. Atylotus agrestis ( Wiedemann, 1828)

( Figs 1 , 5 , 9 )

Aussereuropäische zweiflügelige Insekten, 1, 557.

Type locality. Egypt .

Range. Widespread in the Palearctic and Ethiopian regions, and the Indomalayan region in China, India, and Sri Lanka ( Zhang & Yang, 2018; Evenhuis & Pape, 2023). According to Chvála et al. (1972), A. agrestis is restricted in the Palearctic to Egypt, new records show an extensive expansion to the north, to Saudi Arabia ( Al Dhafer et al., 2009), to the Sinai Peninsula ( Müller et al., 2012b) and to Israel. In Israel this species was first mentioned by Theodor (1965) from a single specimen collected in Eilat in 1962. Later, in the mid-1990’s, we observed this species common along the Rift Valley up to the Sea of Galilee. It established itself along the coast of Israel up to the Lebanese border within the last ten years and is fairly common now (unpublished data).

New records. The most northern record is one female from a Malaise trap catch from Lebanon , the Bequaa Valley, a farm south of Zahle, July 2007, stored in the collection of G. Müller (new record for Lebanon) . In Cyprus, near the Limassol Salt Lake , we observed several specimens of this species feeding on horses, in mid-May 2015 and late June 2018; in early July 2019, two specimens were caught attempting to bite one of the coauthors. It is noteworthy that prior to 2015, we did not observe this species at this site (new record for Cyprus and Europe) . It is worthwhile mentioning that we have recently obtained a single male from an automatic light trap catch during a Lepidoptera survey in Italy, Pantelleria, on 17 June 2019 (new record for Italy) .

Figures

Figures 1–4. Adults of Tabanidae, dorsal view. 1. Atylotus agrestis. 2. Tabanus gratus. 3. Tabanus taeniola. 4. Tabanus sufis. Scale bar – 5 mm

Figures 5–8. Adults of Tabanidae, lateral view. 5. Atylotus agrestis. 6. Tabanus gratus. 7. Tabanus taeniola. 8. Tabanus sufis. Scale bar – 5 mm.

Figures 9–12. Adults of Tabanidae, frontal view. 9. Atylotus agrestis. 10. Tabanus gratus. 11. Tabanus taeniola. 12. Tabanus sufis. Scale bar – 5 mm.