New Zealand Entomologist 26: 15-28 (December 2003) Coleoptera genera of New Zealand Richard A. B. Leschen1, John F. Lawrence2, Guillermo Kuschel3, Stephen Thorpe4, Qiao Wang5, 1 New Zealand Arthropod Collection, Landcare Research, Private Bag 92170, Auckland, New Zealand, email:
[email protected] 2 CSIRO Entomology, G.P.O. Box 1700, Canberra, A.C.T., Australia 3 7 Tropicana Drive, Mt Roskill, Auckland, New Zealand 4 Entomology Department, Auckland War Memorial Museum, Private Bag 92018, Auckland 5 Institute of Natural Resources, Massey University, Private Bag 11222, Palmerston North, New Zealand Abstract *labium lacking a silk gland, *abdominal prolegs A checklist for the New Zealand genera of usually absent; pupa adecticous (lacking functional Coleoptera is provided and introductory mouthparts) and usually exarate (legs and wings information on the systematics, species number free from body). and biology is included. A total of 1091 genera are The order is considered monophyletic, though placed into 82 families and 180 subfamilies. there are different opinions regarding the Key words: Beetles, diversity, biogeography, relationships of the Strepsiptera as sister taxon to check list Coleoptera (e.g., compare Kukalova-Peck and Lawrence 1993 with Whiting et al. 1997) based on Introduction morphology and/or combined morphological and The order Coleoptera (beetles) makes up roughly molecular data. There are four suborders one-fifth to one-quarter of the total insect fauna of recognised, Archostemata, Adephaga, Myxophaga the world and is one of the oft-cited cases of and Polyphaga, with the latter comprising the adaptive radiation of organisms. It is the largest largest and most diverse, and the Archostemata as group in New Zealand and remains one of the most the most primitive group (no Archostemata or poorly known groups of insects.