Speovelia maritima Esaki, 1929

Yang, Seokin & Kim, Wonwoong, 2024, New data on the fauna of the water treaders (Hemiptera, Mesoveliidae) of Korea, Biodiversity Data Journal 12, pp. e 136390-e 136390 : e136390-

Speovelia maritima Esaki, 1929

Materials

Type status: Other material. Occurrence: recordedBy: Seokin Yang & Wonwoong Kim; individualCount: 30; sex: 1 ♂, 29 ♀; lifeStage: adult; occurrenceID: 47D5B533-C944-573F-9016-9A536A361926; Taxon: scientificName: Speovelia maritima Esaki, 1929 ; family: Mesoveliidae ; genus: Speovelia ; specificEpithet: maritima ; scientificNameAuthorship: Esaki, 1929; Location: country: Republic of Korea; stateProvince: Chungcheongnam-do; locality: Sinheuk-dong (36.323476, 126.502176), Boryeong-si ; Identification: identifiedBy: Seokin Yang & Wonwoong Kim; Event: eventDate: 19.vi.2024

Type status: Other material. Occurrence: recordedBy: Seokin Yang & Woochan Seo; individualCount: 58; sex: 58 ♀; lifeStage: adult; occurrenceID: 00AB13E4-9BF0-5B64-81AE-43835A957CD1; Taxon: scientificName: Speovelia maritima Esaki, 1929 ; family: Mesoveliidae ; genus: Speovelia ; specificEpithet: maritima ; scientificNameAuthorship: Esaki, 1929; Location: country: Republic of Korea; stateProvince: Chungcheongnam-do; locality: Sinheuk-dong (36.323476, 126.502176), Boryeong-si ; Identification: identifiedBy: Seokin Yang & Wonwoong Kim; Event: eventDate: 03.vii.2024

Distribution

Korea ( CN), Japan (Hokkaido, Honshu, Izu Islands, Ogasawara Islands, Oki Islands, Shikoku, Kyushu, Nansei Islands) ( Hayashi and Miyamoto 2018, Nakajima et al. 2020).

Biology

According to Esaki (1929) and Yuasa (1929), this species dwells on the walls of moist littoral caves where external lights are completely absent. Several distributional records from various localities along the coastline of Japan have been published since, but detailed information on its life history is scarce (cf. Matsuda (2016)).

We collected a number of specimens on the coast of the Yellow Sea, where sandy beaches meet rocky shores and concrete tetrapods (Fig. 2 E). Confirmed habitats were relatively dry and not submerged even in high tides. Large numbers of S. maritima were found actively crawling on the concrete tetrapods and rocks at night. Despite diligent searching, no single individual was found active during the daytime. Taken together, our observations imply that S. maritima could be nocturnal, hiding inside the littoral caves or rocky clefts during the day. In addition, an imbalance in sex ratio was found during the survey: one male amongst 29 females in the first field collection in June and 58 females in the second collection in July. No single nymph was confirmed in both surveys.

Notes

New record for Korea. This species was previously known as a Japanese endemic.

Korean vernacular name

" Ba-da-mul-no-lin-jae " referring to the maritime habitat.

Figures

Figure 2. Habitat and live individuals of Korean Mesoveliidae species. A Habitat of M. vittigera - lotus cultivation area covered with floating vegetation; B M. vittigera, female, collected from this locality; C Habitat of M. thermalis - natural pond with abundant emergent and floating vegetation; D M. thermalis, female, collected from this locality; E Habitat of S. maritima, concrete tetrapod structures on the rocky shore; F S. maritima, female, collected from this locality.