A few questions to the Lucanidae Experts here!

[Bugman]

Hey guys,
I have a few questions concerning the differentiation of some subspecies and identification in general. I hope you can help me out here


1.
How do I distinguish smaller males of Odontolabis femoralis waterstradti and O.f.femoralis?
I have one telodont waterstradti and femoralis with collecting data. But I had amphiodont living Odontolabis femoralis which were said to be from Borneo, thus waterstradti. But I don't really believe that the collecting data was correct. To me they rather looked like femoralis femoralis, because there was no red on the head and there were only two yellow spots on the ventral side, which seems to be typical for femoralis femoralis. The undoubtful waterstradti has the yellow/orange also on the abdomen. What do you think? Was the collection data wrong and they are not waterstradti?

2.
How do I distinguish Prosopocoilus occiptalis anoa from P.o.anoella? Since they are both from Sulawesi the collection data cannot clarify it I guess but I do not see striking differences in the two subspecies.

3.
Are the subspecies of Odontolabis stevensi valid? I have no doubt for O.s.duivenbodei but what about limbata, mamasaensis and yasusukei? O.s.stevensi seems to have males which are completely black but also individuals with orange on the outer sides of the elytra. Some with a constant orange line, some with an interuppted line or just a thin and short stripe. It seems the subspecies always have the orange on their elytra but when I compare pictures of the subspecies with several phenotypes of O.s.stevensi it looks like the subspecies are just the above mentioned variations of O.s.stevensi.
So I just got this one labeled as O.s.mamasaensis. What do you say? Are the subspecies valid or just synonyms to stevensi stevensi?





4.
I bought this Lucanus here labeled as Lucanus parryi but to me it rather looks like a small male of Lucanus laetus.
So what species is it actually?

[Bugman]

5.

I bought these two Odontolabis cuvera. One is labeled as O.c.fallaciosa and the other one as O.c.sinensis. But the orange line on the elytra of the O.c.sinensis which I already got in my collection (from Chiang Mai, Thailand) is much thinner and more reddish. Is it labeled wrong or is there a greater variation within this subspecies? And how do I distinguish the O.cuvera subspecies in general?

[Bugman]

Can nobody help me here?

[poisonarrow]

Hi there,

I have wondered about the same exact topics as well. Sadly never really got to a conclusion on all of them.

Regardings ome of your questions. To my knowledge O. femoralis waterstradti always has the orange spot on the head. I have seen quite a few specimen, and never seen any waterstradti without it. Plus, they are quite rare, compared to the nominate, and as such, i doubt that much lifestock has ever made it out of Borneo.

Regarding the O. cuvera. In my understanding, I always thought that subspecies sinensis has the narrow more red bands, and fallaciosa has broader orange bands. However, a lot of dealers/collectors seem to mess up the data, and hence the confusion. I have bred O. cuvera fallaciosa and they breed true, all offspring were broad-orange banded. Hope that helps.

Regarding the stevensi, I think mamasaensis is from Mamasa valley, and as such quite restricted in its distribution. With the different subspecies of stevensi, I always thought they did not overlap, and as such location would be a good first indication.

All that said, I am not a taxonomist and as such might be missing some important details.

Cheers
Ben

[lucanidae25]

Smaller males Odontolabis femoralis westerstradti always have a smaller heads, red arms and red spot on the heads. The body is slimmer.

Here's a westerstradti from Sabah I caught live.

[lucanidae25]

Here's a pic of a smaller westerstradti

[Bugman]

Hi guys thanks for your replies!

Dr. Schenk told me that amphiodont males of femoralis femoralis and femoralis waterstradti are quite hard to distinguish. But the females of waterstradti are more elongated they have a broader black part on their elytra.
He also thinks that the subspecies of O.stevensi are valid although this is rather subjective because there are transitional forms.
The Lucanus is confirmed to be a small male of L.laetus but Huang and Chen stated in 2010 that L.laetus is a subspecies of L.parryi because there are no differences in the genitals.
According to Dr. Schenk the subspecies fallaciosa and sinensis of O.cuvera should be ranked to the species level. He confirmed that both of my pictured specimens are fallaciosa.

But I am still doubtful with my O.femoralis. Raymond says that waterstradti always have red legs and the red spot on the head. But femoralis femoralis also have red legs and depending on the light a somewhat red spot on the head.

In the pictures is one of the questionable waterstradti males.
What do you say?

[mothman27]

Those are some neat beetles. If I ever get into raising beetles, I think Odontolabis would be a cool genus to breed.

[poisonarrow]

Thanks Bugman, did Dr. Schenk explain the difference between O. c. fallaciosa and O. c. sinensis, other than the breadth of the orange/red line? seems to me a bit of a shaky thing to just base it on that feature, especially since specimen data seems to overlap quite a bit (which of course migth be due to dealers mis-labelling their mass-specimen)

Cheers
ben

[lucanidae25]

I think yours are O.femoralis femoralis, westerstradti always have red front arms.

Differences are quite easy to spot side by side.

[Bugman]

Ahh now I see! Thanks Raymond

ben: Dr. Schenk mentioned that O.sinensis is only found in eastern China and O.fallaciosa has a much wider distribution with many variable forms from southern China, Vietnam, Laos and Thailand. Unfortunately he did not mention how to differentiate the two (sub)species.

[lucanidae25]

Between O.c.sinensis and O.c.fallaciosa is not that easy.
In the photo from left to right. Sorry for the bad photo, I only took it with my phone.

1)Tam Dao, Vietnam.
2)Guangxi, China.
3)Qingyuan, Guangdong, China.
4)Naing, Guangdong, China.
5)Yunnan, China.
6)Chang Rai, Thailand.
7)Houa Phan, Laos.
8)Nghe An, Vietnam.

The fallaciosa is easy to spot but the sinensis is a lot more difficult to spot. The only true sinensis is from Naing, Guangdong, China.
I went to each country to find them so the data would be correct.

I think it more like a slow change over each area. The one from Qingyuan, Guangdong, China is the in-between.