Range Expansion of the Exotic Cerambycid Beetle, Paraglenea fortunei, in Kii Peninsula, Western Japan

Abstract

Range expansion of the exotic cerambycid beetle Paraglenea fortunei (Saunders, 1853) on the Kii Peninsula was tracked. A literature-based survey of this species revealed that it was first observed in Ise-shi in Mie Prefecture and in northern Nara Prefecture in the 1970s. Ten or twenty years after becoming established, the species started to spread toward the south of the peninsula. We traced the expansion of this species from 1999 to 2008 using field observations in Wakayama, Nara and Mie Prefectures. The range of the beetle extended southward annually, reaching the southernmost area of the peninsula by 2008; it took 37 years from first being discovered to occupy the whole peninsula.