Distribution of the European mole cricket Gryllotalpa gryllotalpa (Orthoptera) in Slovakia

Abstract

Gryllotalpa gryllotalpa is widely distributed in the lowlands and hilly regions of southern, western, eastern Slovakia, outside the mountains as the High and Low Tatras. It was found at 516 sites, including 136 sites (5.3% of 2,561 studied sites) which were recorded using regular Orthoptera mapping of primary habitats in 1994–2021 and 380 other sites acquired from a questionnaire survey in 2020 and 2021. Altogether 72 % of the records were collected below 350 m a.s.l., and 98% below 700 m a.s.l. The habitat structure was biased by the result of questionnaire survey (recording mainly secondary habitats), with gardens (> 70%, n = 516) being the most frequent habitat. During regular Orthoptera mapping of primary habitats the most frequently inhabited environments were wet grasslands, marshes (42 %) and meadows (30%, n = 136). Suspected occurrence of the closely related species G. stepposa was investigated at nine lowland sites in southern Slovakia (6 in the Danube River area and 3 in the Ipeľ River area) in 2020 and 2021, but all the determined males (11) belonged to the species G. gryllotalpa. Distributional patterns of the species in Slovakia have been compared with neighboring countries of Europe.