Xylocopa (Koptortosoma) pubescens Spinola, 1838

Ruiz, Carlos, Suarez, Daniel, Naranjo, Manuel & De la Rua, Pilar, 2020, First record of the carpenter bee Xylocopa pubescens (Hymenoptera, Apidae) in the Canary Islands confirmed by DNA barcoding, Journal of Hymenoptera Research 80, pp. 169-175 : 169

Xylocopa (Koptortosoma) pubescens Spinola, 1838

New records.

Spain: Canary Islands, Gran Canaria, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. 1 ♀ Ciudad Jardín, 11 Jun. 2020, Kings Ruly obs.; several ex. Parque Doramas, 28.120, -15.428, Jun. 2020, Pablo Martínez Darve obs.; 1 ♀ Mercado central, 06 Jul. 2020, 28.133, -15.432, Manuel Betancor obs.; 1 ♀ Playa de las Canteras, 28.142, -15.432, 18 Aug. 2020; 1 ♀, 1♂ Parque Doramas, 28.120, -15.428, 2 Oct. 2020, Manuel Arechavaleta obs.; 4 ♀, 5 ♂, Parque de La Ballena, 28.1052, -15.4424, 30 Sept. 2020, M. Naranjo obs.; 1 ♀, 1♂ Urbanización Las Filipinas, 28.0761, -15.4198, 25 Sept. 2020, M. Naranjo leg.

Spain: Canary Islands, Gran Canaria, Maspalomas. 1 ♀ Playa del Inglés, 27.749, -15.578, 05 Sep. 2020, Carlos Velázquez Padrón leg.

Identification.

Xylocopa pubescens was identified at subgenus level ( Koptortosoma ) by its external morphology. It is morphologically unique among Canary Island bees; the only species of Xylocopa on the archipelago is X. violacea . From this last species, X. pubescens can be easily differentiated by the mesosoma covered dorsally with yellow hairs. Males are smaller than females, and they can be distinguished by a narrow head and yellow pubescence covering their entire body (Fig. 1 ). However due to morphological similarities with related species such as X. modesta Smith, 1854 from Cape Verde, X. aestuans (Linnaeus, 1758) from Southeast Asia or X. appendiculata Smith, 1852 (introduced in North America), a molecular identification through barcode was accomplished. An individual from Las Palmas de Gran Canaria city was successfully sequenced for the barcode region of mitochondrial cox1. Sequence length was 658 bp (0% ambiguities) with no evidence of stop codons or NUMTs. Comparison with the DNA barcode library using the BOLD ID Engine resulted in a 99.35% of similarity with an exemplar of X. pubescens from Fes-Boulemane Region (Rif region, North of Morocco). Individuals from Cyprus and Israel showed lower similarity (99.23-99.07%). NCBI Blast resulted in 97.26% of similarity with the related species Xylocopa aestuans .

Figures

Figure 1. Pictures of Xylocopa pubescens (male left; female right) in the Parque de La Ballena (Las Palmas de Gran Canaria). Photos: M. Naranjo.