Distribution, habitats, phenology and conservation of New Caledonian Odonata
Author
Grand, Daniel
Author
Marinov, Milen
Author
Jourdan, Herve
Author
Cook, Carl
Author
Rouys, Sophie
Author
Mille, Christian
Author
Theuerkauf, Jörn
text
Zootaxa
2019
2019-07-19
4640
1
1
112
journal article
26165
10.11646/zootaxa.4640.1
1c74afbc-0c31-4b2b-b975-af79979613ab
1175-5326
3342242
434B2D49-EC2C-4246-8703-42C6CFD31B87
Orthetrum serapia
/
sabina
Davies (2002)
reported
O. sabina
(Drury, 1773)
for
New Caledonia
and wrote that it was common. However, we never found this species during our field work. All specimens that we found were from the closely related
O. serapia
Watson, 1984
. Therefore,
Davies (2002)
might have misidentified
O. serapia
as
O. sabina
. When we published our key to
New Caledonia
and
Wallis
&
Futuna
(
Grand
et al.
2014
), we assumed that only
O. sabina
occurred on these archipelagos. We also found
O. serapia
and not
O. sabina
on
Wallis and Futuna
(authors’ unpublished data). To correct the error, we compare the diagnostic features of both species in
Figure 91
.
Distribution
(
Fig. 92
).
Orthetrum sabina
has a wide range within the Afrotropical, Oriental, Australasian and Oceanic regions (
Tsuda 2000
). It even reaches in the north the southern borders of the Palearctic region, from
Tunisia
in the west to
Japan
in the east (
Tsuda 2000
).
Orthetrum serapia
is distributed wide across the Pacific reaching
Australia
to the west and
Tonga
to east (
Marinov & Waqa-Sakiti 2013
). Both species are present in the
Northern Territory
and north east of
Australia
(
Theischinger & Hawking 2006
), therefore their coexistence in
New Caledonia
is not to be excluded.
However, in a recently published study on the
Odonata
fauna of
Vanuatu
Marinov
et al.
(2019)
reported
O. serapia
for the islands of Efate and Malekula but not for Aneityum and suggested that the southern limit of the species distribution within the Pacific lays along 18–
19°S
which is just at the northern most end of Grande Terre of
New Caledonia
. In
Australia
(
Theischinger & Endersby 2009
), the species reaches even further south to around 22°.
Habitat.
Both species occur in sunny places at standing and running water and tolerates moderately salinity.
Biology and behaviour.
The larva of
O. sabina
was illustrated by
Lieftinck (1962)
. Its habits are similar to
O. caledonicum
.
Status.
Due to the lack of information on we rank these species DD.