Melolontha Explained

Melolontha is a genus of beetles in the family Scarabaeidae. The European cockchafers belong to this genus.

Taxonomy

Linnaeus called the European cockchafer Scarabaeus melolontha. Étienne Louis Geoffroy used Melolontha as a genus name (1762), but his book has been suppressed by the International Commission of Zoological Nomenclature, and the authority for the name is the later (1775) publication by Johan Christian Fabricius.^[1]

Species

The following is a list of species within the genus Melolontha:

• Melolontha aceris Faldermann, 1835
• Melolontha afflicta Ballion, 1870
• Melolontha albida Frivaldszky, 1835
• Melolontha anita Reitter, 1902
• Melolontha argus Burmeister 1855
• Melolontha bifurcata (Brenske, 1896)
• Melolontha chinensis (Guerin, 1838)
• Melolontha ciliciensis Petrovitz
• Melolontha flabellata Sharp, 1876
• Melolontha frater Arrow, 1913 – Indonesia
• Melolontha fuscotestacea Kraatz, 1887
• Melolontha guttigera Sharp, 1876
• Melolontha hippocastani Fabricius, 1801 – European forest cockchafer
• Melolontha incana Motschulsky, 1853
• Melolontha insulana Burmeister, 1939
• Melolontha japonica Burmeister, 1855
• Melolontha kraatzi Reitter 1906
• Melolontha melolontha (Linnaeus, 1758) – common European cockchafer
• Melolontha papposa Illiger, 1803
• Melolontha pectoralis Megerle von Mühlfeld, 1812 – European large cockchafer
• Melolontha rubiginosa
• Melolontha rufocrassa Fairmaire, 1889
• Melolontha satsumaenis Niijima & Kinoshita
• Melolontha taygetana Rey, 1999
• Melolontha virescens Brenske, 1896

Notes and References

1. Web site: AnimalBase :: Melolontha genustaxon homepage. www.animalbase.uni-goettingen.de.