Overview
Most Trogossitidae are predacious as larvae and adults, but
Larinotus umbilicatus
feeds on fungus fruiting bodies and some Lophocaterinae may also be mycophagous. Most trogossitids are found under bark, but Rentoniinae are usually collected in leaf litter. Species of
Lepidopteryx
(
Leperina
), our most common genus, are clothed with scales or bristles forming a pattern.
Description
The family, as here constituted, was divided by Crowson (1970) into three separate families and includes several subgroups with very different looking adults. Most species are ovate to elongate and more or less flattened, with a prognathous head, short antennae bearing a large, loose, slightly asymmetrical, 3-segmented club, and a vestiture of short or long hairs, bristles or scales.
Larinotus
, however, is strongly convex with a deflexed head;
Egolia
is subcylindrical and glabrous; all members of the Egoliinae have a 1- or 2-segmented, compact antennal club; and Rentoniinae are minute, globose and clambid-like. Although the tarsi are always 5-segmented, the first segment may be reduced and partly concealed by the tibial apex. Subovate, flattened trogossitids, like
Ancyrona laticeps
, are similar to some Nitidulidae, but in the latter the antennal club is much smaller and more compact.
Larvae elongate, parallel-sided, slightly to strongly flattened, and lightly sclerotised, except for head and usually additional sclerites on thorax and T9; mandible usually with 1 or several hyaline processes at base of mesal edge; ventral mouth-parts consolidated, without articulating areas; hypostomal rods usually long and parallel;
paragular
sclerites usually present between gula and hypostomal rods; urogomphi well developed in most species but minute in
Larinotus
.
Distribution
The introduced
Tenebroides mauritanicus
is a cosmopolitan stored product pest; although basically predacious, both adults and larvae will feed directly on grain and seeds. [Aitken 1975; Crowson 1964b, 1966a, 1970; Lawrence 1980; Mamaev 1976b.]