Chelostoma (Gyrodromella) handlirschi Schletterer, 1889

Müller, Andreas, 2015, Palaearctic Chelostoma bees of the subgenus Gyrodromella (Megachilidae, Osmiini): biology, taxonomy and key to species, Zootaxa 3936 (3), pp. 408-420 : 416

Chelostoma (Gyrodromella) handlirschi Schletterer, 1889

Chelostoma handlirschi Schletterer, 1889: 624 . Type material: Lectotype ♂, by present designation, “Mehadia 1859” ( Romania), Entomological Collection ETH Zurich.

New records. BULGARIA: Arkutino S of Burgas, 19.6.– 14.7.1970, 28.5.– 9.6.1971; Harmanli, 17.5.1979; Sozopol, 6.1987; Slancev Brjag, 2.6.– 6.7.2008; 5km NE of Harmandli, 14.6.2008; Lozenec, 16.6.2008; 15km SW of Elchovo, Knazevo, 19.6.2008; Sinemorec, 22.6.1998. ROMANIA: Cozla W of Turnu Severin, 26.5.2002.

Distribution. Reliable records exist only for Romania and Bulgaria. The records of C. handlirschi given by Zanden (1984) for Macedonia and by Schletterer (1889) for Turkey are not free of doubt as the identification of these individuals could not be checked (see Notes). The occurrence of C. handlirschi in northern Italy ( Schletterer 1889) seems highly improbable.

Pollen hosts. Probably oligolectic on Campanula (Campanulaceae) and possibly also closely related genera (based on the microscopical analysis of 1 pollen load).

Nesting biology. Unknown.

Notes. C. handlirschi was obviously unknown to most European bee taxonomists including K. Warncke, who treated C. hebraeum and C. nasutum as subspecies of C. handlirschi . Thus, literature records of C. handlirschi as well as specimens labelled as C. handlirschi are expected to often refer to C. aegaeicum , C. hebraeum or C. nasutum .

The syntype series of C. handlirschi consisting of males and females from “Nord-Italien, Ungarn (Mehadia), Kleinasien” ( Schletterer, 1889) could be located neither in the Natural History Museum Wien nor in the Hungarian Natural History Museum Budapest (M. Vizek and Z. Vas, personal communication), suggesting that Schletterer did not deposit the syntypes in these two museums as mentioned in the original publication. However, a male specimen collected at Mehadia in 1859 and labelled as C. handlirschi with the handwriting probably of Schletterer was found in the Schulthess collection at ETH Zürich. This male, which most likely belongs to the syntype series, is here newly designated as lectotype.

The description of the female of C. handlirschi by Schletterer (1889) does not agree with the morphology of typical C. handlirschi females collected together with males identical to the lectotype of C. handlirschi . Thus, the two sexes described by Schletterer are not conspecific, which suggests that the information Schletterer gives on the species’ distribution range might be partly erroneous (see Distribution). As no female syntype could be found, the species identity of Schletterer’s females remains unclear, the characters listed by Schletterer, however, fit best to C. (Chelostoma) comosum Müller.