Eleteridae (Coleoptera) of the Eastern Black Sea Region of Turkey: Fauna, Some Ecological Evaluations, and Zoogeographical Composition

ABSTRACT The ecological properties and zoogeographical composition of the Elateridae fauna of the Eastern Black Sea region is presented. During field studies, 53 species belonging to five subfamilies and 23 genera were collected. Among these, 13 species are recorded for the first time from the research area and detailed locality records for Turkey were given for two of them. With the addition of previously reported one subfamily, 11 genera and 61 species from research area in present literature, it is exhibited that there are six subfamilies, 34 genera and 114 species belong to Elateridae fauna of the Eastern Black Sea region, which represents almost 23.1% of Elateridae fauna of Turkey. Most of the Elateridae fauna of the Black Sea region comprises from the species of subfamilies Elaterinae and Dendrometrinae. The genus Athous is the most species-rich genus. Results of this study also exhibit that, species numbers of research area represents 25.3% of total species numbers of detected genera of Turkey. Artvin province is the most species-rich part of research area. The Black Sea region of Turkey shares the most species in common with the European part of the Western Palaearctic region.