Plant Protection (Scientific Journal of Agriculture)

Plant Protection (Scientific Journal of Agriculture)

Note on Melyris oblonga (Fabricius, 1775) (Coleoptera: Melyridae) from SW Iran

Document Type : Short communication-ٍEnglish

Authors
M. Esfandiari 1
F. karamolachaab 2
1 Department of Plant Protection, Faculty of Agriculture, Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz, Ahvaz, Iran
2 Department of plant protection, Faculty of Agriculture, Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz, Ahvaz, Iran
10.22055/ppr.2026.51416.1870
Abstract
This study documents new biological and distributional information on Melyris oblonga (Fabricius, 1775) from southwestern Iran, representing the first confirmed record of the species from this region. Larvae were discovered inhabiting a basidiomycete fungus growing on Ziziphus spina-christi. Rearing attempts indicated that the larvae persisted for extended periods when maintained on the fungus, with one individual successfully developing into an adult under controlled laboratory conditions. The resulting specimen was identified as M. oblonga and deposited in the insect collection of Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz. According to observations, the species may complete a single generation annually. Morphological traits of both the larval and adult stages are briefly described, with the known geographic range updated to include southern Iran. The findings also complement scattered reports on the species’ association with indoor habitats, stored products, and fungal substrates, offering new insight into the ecology as well as developmental biology of a poorly studied melyrid.
Keywords
basidiomycete fungus
Species distribution
fauna
Melyrini
Subjects
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 © 2026 by the authors. Licensee SCU, Ahvaz, Iran. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0 license) (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/.
Plant Protection (Scientific Journal of Agriculture)
Volume 49, Issue 1
Winter 2026
Pages 109-115