Abstract
The genus Megarthrus Curtis 1829 with about 139 species described around the world, is the largest of the subfamily Proteininae (Coleoptera: Staphylinidae) (Cuccodoro 2011). Megarthrus is distributed worldwide (Cuccodoro 1999) but it is apparently more diverse in the Holartic region (Navarrete-Heredia et al. 2002). However, the South American fauna is underestimated because many of the collected specimens are not yet described (Cuccodoro 2011). Newton et al. (2005) cited the genus as probable in Colombia because some species are known from Central America and northern South America, but until now, no species has been published from Colombia. Therefore, M. andinus sp. nov. represents the first record of the genus and subfamily for this country.
References
Bierig, A. (1940) Proteinini (Col. Staph.) Costaricenses. Revista de Entomología, 11, 373–380.
Cuccodoro, G. (1999) Four new species of Megarthrus Curtis, 1829 (Coleoptera, Staphylinidae, Proteininae) from the Bale Mountains, southern Ethiopia. Bulletin de la Société entomologique suisse, 72, 373–386.
Cuccodoro, G. (2011) Revision of the Neotropical types of Megarthrus Curtis, 1829 and description of two new species from Costa Rica and Peru (Coleoptera, Staphylinidae, Proteininae). Revue Suisse de Zoologie, 118 (1), 107–147.
Curtis, J. (1829) A guide to an arrangement of British Insects: being a catalogue of all the named species hitherto discovered in Great Britain and Ireland, London, Westley, 332 pp.
Navarrete-Heredia, J.L., Newton, A.F., Thayer, M.K., Ashe, J.S. & Chandler, D.S. (2002) Guía ilustrada para los géneros de Staphylinidae (Coleóptera) en México, México, 401 pp.
Newton, A.F., Gutiérrez-Chacón, C. & Chandler, D.S. (2005) Checklist of the Staphylinidae (Coleoptera) of Colombia. Biota Colombiana, 6 (1), 1–7.