The Boridae are a small family of
tenebrionoid beetle
Beetles are insects that form the Taxonomic rank, order Coleoptera (), in the superorder Holometabola. Their front pair of wings are hardened into wing-cases, elytra, distinguishing them from most other insects. The Coleoptera, with about 40 ...
s with no vernacular common name, though recent authors have coined the name conifer bark beetles. The family contains three genera. ''
Boros'' is native to North America and northern Eurasia, ''
Lecontia'' is endemic to North America, while ''
Synercticus'' is found in Australia and New Guinea. The larvae of ''Boros'' are found under bark and are especially associated with
standing dead trees (snags), typically
pines
A pine is any conifer tree or shrub in the genus ''Pinus'' () of the family Pinaceae. ''Pinus'' is the sole genus in the subfamily Pinoideae.
''World Flora Online'' accepts 134 species-rank taxa (119 species and 15 nothospecies) of pines as ...
, found in
old-growth forests. ''Lecontia'' larvae are found inhabiting damp parts of the root system of dead standing trees. Little is known of the life habits of ''Synercticus.''
[Pollock, Darren A.. "11.21. Boridae C. G.Thomson, 1859". ''Volume 2 Morphology and Systematics (Elateroidea, Bostrichiformia, Cucujiformia partim)'', edited by Willy Kükenthal, Richard A.B. Leschen, Rolf G. Beutel and John F. Lawrence, Berlin, New York: De Gruyter, 2011, pp. 699-704.]
Taxonomy
* Genus ''
Boros''
Herbst, 1797
** ''
Boros schneideri''
(Panzer, 1795)
** ''
Boros unicolor''
Say, 1827
* Genus ''
Lecontia''
Champion, 1889
** ''
Lecontia discicollis''
LeConte, 1850
* Genus ''
Synercticus''
Newman, 1842
** ''
Synercticus heteromerus''
Newman, 1842
References
External links
Boridae Species Listat Joel Hallan's Biology Catalog. Texas A&M University. Retrieved on 15 Jul 2011.
Tenebrionoidea
Beetle families
Taxa named by Carl Gustaf Thomson
{{Tenebrionoidea-stub