ENGLISH:
The story of this insect is fascinating: A couple of
specimens were collected by Claude Gay during early
1800´s, and they were sent to Paris were they were
studied by Solier.The actual description appears in Gays
book, 1843. No specimens were
collected for 150 years, and we thought that it was a
mislabelled specimen from Gay. We made several trips to the
Area were it was suppossed to live but never found
it. Coming back from a trip to
the Atacama desert we stayed at the West coastal region of
Atacama. One morning my daughter Francisca came back to the
camper with a specimen (The one shown here) of a
Tenebrionidae unknown to me. We turned every stone, sieved
every dune and found some 50 specimens, later these were
compared with the Type from Paris and in fact belong to the
same species. Why was impossible to collect it for 150
years, I just don´t know.
Nothing is known from its larvae or
life cycle.
ESPAÑOL:
Una historia fascinante. Claudio Gay encontró dos
ejemplares de esta especie en el Desierto de Atacama durante
el siglo pasado. Estos fueron estudiados en el Museo de
Paris y su descripción aparece en el Atlas de Gay. No
se encontró más ejemplares por 150 años
a pesar de que hicimos múltiples viajes a
encontrarlo. Pensamos que se trataba de un error en los
datos y este insecto en realidad no vivía
allí.Hace pocos años volviendo de un viaje de
colecta, pernoctamos en la costa Atacameña, y a la
mañana siguiente mi hija Francisca encontró un
Tenebriónido desconocido para mi, que al compararlo
con los ejemplares de Gay, resultaron ser la misma especie.
¿Porqué no lo encontramos en los viajes
anteriorees? No lo sé..
