ANISOLABIDAE, Verhoeff, 1902

Popham, Edward J., 2000, The geographical distribution of the Dermaptera (Insecta) with reference to continental drift, Journal of Natural History 34 (10), pp. 2007-2027 : 2016-2017

ANISOLABIDAE

( Map 7 )

Recent authors have created new genera and subgenera, without indicating their mutual a nities of these subfamilies. As the systematics of this family is in a state

¯ux, Sakai’s (1982) list of subfamilies has been followed (table 6).

In ®gure 4 the subfamilies are given in the order as listed by Sakai (1982). Of the ten subfamilies of the Anisolabiidae, one is restricted to the Galapagos Islands, two to South America, the Platylabinae to the Oriental Region with six occurring

South America. This points to a neotropical origin for this family, which ®rst spread eastwards to Africa, India, the Orient and from there to Australasia and

Subfamily Occurrence of each subfamily with the number of species given in brackets

Parisolabinae Greece (1), India (2), East Indies (1) Australia (1) and New

Zealand (8) Idolopsalinae Mexico (1), South America (11) Isolaboidinae Turkey (1), Lebanon (1), India (1) Anophthalmolabinae Galapagos Islands (1) Gonolabinae Peru (3) and Chile (1) Brachylabinae South America (7), Africa (4), Madagascar (4), Orient (5), East

Indies (1), New Zealand (1), Polynesia (13) Antisolabinae Africa (1), Seychelles (1), India (1), Australia,(1), New

Zealand (1), New Guinea (1) and Fiji (1) Isolabinae South America (5), Africa (22), Orient (15), East Indies (2),

Australia (1) Platylabinae Burma (1) and India (2) Anisolabidinae North America (2), South America (20), Europe (3), Africa (93),

Madagascar (2), Orient (68), East Indies (21), New Guinea (12),

Australia (13), New Zealand (5), Polynesia (16) and

Cosmopolitan (2)

Polynesia. An alternative explanation is that this large family originated in Africa and then spread westwards into South America and eastwards to India and western Australia. The exceptionally wide distribution of this family, from the Galapagos Islands to Polynesia (map 7) shows that it is probably the oldest for®culine family, with a predominantly circumtropical distribution.

Figures

MAP 7. Distribution of the Anisolabiidae.