All four phyletic lines of Staphylinidae include species that occur nowhere but in intertidal zones. One line includes a genus (Bledius) in which some species are halobionts, some living in inland salt habitats, others in coastal salt habitats, and some in both. About 300 species (in about 70 genera) live in saline habitats, but these are a scant proportion of the >47000 species (in >3200 genera) in the family. Put into perspective, the species in saline habitats are fewer than those specialized as inquilines in the nests of social insects, yet specialization to saline habitats is as bizarre and involves behavioral and physiological adaptations to salt and tide. Intertidal staphylinids occur from the Arctic Ocean to the sub-Antarctic islands, with a much richer fauna in the Pacific than in the Atlantic. Cafius (Staphylininae) and Bryothinusa (Aleocharinae) are the most speciose genera of intertidal staphylinids, the former occurring worldwide, the latter reported only from the Pacific Ocean and Red Sea.
Species 1: Coleoptera Staphylinidae (rove beetles)
Keywords: intertidal, halobiont
The ESA 2001 Annual Meeting - 2001: An Entomological Odyssey of ESA