| Aegithus | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Aegithus burmeisteri from Manu National Park, Peru | |
Scientific classification  | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Arthropoda |
| Clade: | Pancrustacea |
| Class: | Insecta |
| Order: | Coleoptera |
| Suborder: | Polyphaga |
| Infraorder: | Cucujiformia |
| Family: | Erotylidae |
| Genus: | Aegithus Fabricius, 1801 |
| Type species | |
| Chrysomela clavicornis Linnaeus, 1758 | |
| Synonyms | |
|
Aegithomimus Mader, 1942 | |
Aegithus is a neotropical genus of pleasing fungus beetles (family Erotylidae) in subfamily Erotylinae.
These beetles are rather large by their family's standards (about 7-17.5 mm long, 5-15.5 mm wide), and have a rounded "hump-backed" shape as adults; overall, they resemble a large plump species of ladybeetle. Their 11-segmented antennae form a "club" at the tips which consists of distinct segments. The head is stretched out and blunt-snouted, with compound eyes composed of small ommatidia. The prothorax is not strongly curved, with sharp-angled forward edges and a conspicuously indented front margin to fit the prominent head. The last segment of the maxillary palps is wider than long, the maxillary lacinia bear two small teeth, and the mouth-cavity sides are flattened lobes. On the legs' tarsi, the first three segments are increasingly widened.
While many Aegithus species have the yellowish-and-black coloration often seen in pleasing fungus beetles, some show, more unusually for this subfamily, bright red colors. Among their subfamily, they seem to be a rather ancient lineage retaining many ancestral traits, such as a general lack of complicated color patterns (zigzag bands or eyespots) and larvae which feed singly on polypore fungi.
Aegithus contains some 75 described species:
A review of the UPN collection found 7 identifiable species represented among the 41 Aegithus specimens, with records from across the southeastern half of Colombia but none northwest of Boyacá and Valle del Cauca departments. Apart from the common A.clavicornis, all of the species seemed to be spottily distributed. And in addition, 4 specimens (about 10%) from Cundinamarca and Tolima departments in central Colombia could only be assigned to Aegithus, but not to a species known from the region.
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