Saperda scalaris (Linnaeus, 1758)

Karpinski, Lech, Szczepanski, Wojciech T., lewa, Radoslaw, Walczak, Marcin, Hilszczanski, Jacek, Kruszelnicki, Lech, Los, Krzysztof, Jaworski, Tomasz, Marek Bidas, & Tarwacki, Grzegorz, 2018, New data on the distribution, biology and ecology of the longhorn beetles from the area of South and East Kazakhstan (Coleoptera, Cerambycidae), ZooKeys 805, pp. 59-126 : 100-101

Saperda scalaris (Linnaeus, 1758) Fig. 4K

Material examined.

East Kazakhstan Region: Bykovo [ Быково] env. (49°39'N, 84°33'E), 571 m a.s.l., 21 VI 2017, 1♀, leg. WTS.

Remarks.

This species is widespread in the Palaearctic region and is distributed from Western Europe to the Far East, while S. s. hieroglyphica (Pallas, 1773) ranges from European Russia through Kazakhstan, Mongolia and China to the Far East ( Danilevsky 2018a).

In contrast to the nominotypical subspecies whose pubescence is intensively yellowish, this taxon is characterised by a constant bluish colour of its pale pubescence ( Danilevsky 2018c). However, distinguishing a subspecies based only on a colour difference is rather doubtful, and therefore, it is considered by some authors (e.g. Sama 2002) to be a synonym of a nominotypical subspecies. According to Bussler (2013), both forms can be found in the Southern Carpathians. In this case, the colour variation may be caused by its association with a different host plant. In Siberia, this polyphagous species is mainly associated with the birch Betula platyphylla ( Cherepanov 1991b), thus a rather whitish colouration may facilitate its camouflage on birch bark. Such a hypothesis seems to be confirmed by Hoskovec et al. (2016) in the case of S. perforata . The authors explained this phenomenon as a prototypical mimicry and claimed that the colour of imagines is determined by the host plant, and thus adults whose larvae developed in the Eurasian aspen Populus tremula usually have a yellow-green or yellow-grey colour integument, whereas the beetles that developed in the white poplar Populus alba are usually grey. In Kazakhstan, we also observed similar white pubescence forms in the case of other related, though not associated with birches, species - S. alberti , S. perforata and S. similis (Fig. 4I, J, L). Therefore, a new synonymy is proposed: Cerambyx scalaris Linnaeus, 1758 = Cerambyx hieroglyphicus Pallas, 1773, syn. n.

A single female was found on the bark of a harvested birch log at the edge of mountain deciduous grove consisted mainly of Populus , Betula and Salix (Fig. 15C).