Antitrogus

Childers canegrub Antitrogus parvulus, from PaDIL.

Belongs within: Melolonthini.

Antitrogus is a genus of chafers endemic to eastern Australia. They are rarely collected, seemingly not feeding as adults and only emerging for very brief periods on just a few days of the year (Britton 1978).

Characters (from Britton 1978): Anterior face of the clypeus deep (ratio greatest width: mid depth 3.5–4.8:1), bearing scattered setiferous punctures in the middle as well as towards the sides, anterior edge of the clypeus as seen from above not broadly bilobed; antennae 10-segmented, with a 3–7-lamellate club; head, pronotum, elytra and abdomen not densely and uniformly clothed with short setae, bare or with minute setae which lie largely within their punctures, or with long, sparse, irregularly distributed setae but without scales or flattened adpressed setae; sutures separating abdominal sternites 3–5 fainter in the middle than at the sides.

Antitrogus Burmeister 1855 HW92
    |--*A. tasmanicus Burmeister 1855 [incl. A. nigricornis Blackburn 1911] HW92
    |--A. adamsi Britton 1978 HW92
    |--A. adustus Britton 1978 HW92
    |--A. brooksi Britton 1978 HW92
    |--A. burmeisteri Burmeister 1911 HW92
    |--A. carnei Britton 1978 HW92
    |--A. circulifrons Britton 1978 HW92
    |--A. morbillosus (Blackburn 1898) [=Rhopaea morbillosa; incl. R. incognita Blackburn 1911] HW92
    |--A. mussoni (Blackburn 1892) (see below for synonymy) HW92
    |--A. nox Britton 1978 HW92
    |--A. parilis Britton 1978 HW92
    |--A. parvulus Britton 1978 HW92
    |--A. planiceps (Blackburn 1911) [=Rhopaea planiceps] HW92
    |--A. politus (Lea 1920) [=Rhopaea polita] W92
    |--A. robertsi Britton 1978 HW92
    |--A. setifer Britton 1978 HW92
    |--A. setifrons Britton 1979 HW92
    `--A. tumidifrons Britton 1978 HW92

Antitrogus mussoni (Blackburn 1892) [=Rhopaea mussoni; incl. R. consanguinea Blackburn 1911, R. dubitans Blackburn 1911, R. rugulosa Blackburn 1911] HW92

*Type species of generic name indicated

REFERENCES

Britton, E. B. 1978. A revision of the Australian chafers (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae: Melolonthinae) vol. 2. Tribe Melolonthini. Australian Journal of Zoology, Supplementary Series 60: 1–150.

[HW92] Houston, W. W. K., & T. A. Weir. 1992. Melolonthinae. In: Houston, W. W. K. (ed.) Zoological Catalogue of Australia vol. 9. Coleoptera: Scarabaeoidea pp. 174–358. AGPS Press: Canberra.

Last updated: 27 April 2021.