Tag Archives: Cryptommata

Cryptommata cucullata Wollaston

False Gumwood Weevil (Cryptommata cucullata)

This species was described in 1877, it was endemic to the island of Saint Helena.

Thomas Vernon Wollaston, the author of the species writes about it.:

My three examples of the C. cucullata were captured by myself, after the early summer rains, about the beginning of february, amongst dead and broken-up sticks (I believe of the Aster gummiferus, Hk. f. [Commidendrum robustum ssp. gummiferum (Roxb.) Cronk; however, probably rather False Gumwood (Commidendrum spurium (G. Forst.) DC.)], at the extreme edge of the great precipice, or craterwall, immediately above West Lodge. It is not unlikely, therefore, that they may represent one of the nearly extinct members of the now rapidly disappearing Aster fauna.)” [1]

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The species was associated with the False Gumwood (Commidendrum spurium) a tree of which in the 1990s only 10 individuals survived in the wild, the False Gumwood Weevil has never been recorded since the 19th century and is clearly already extinct. [2]

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References:

[1] T. Vernon Wollaston: Coleoptera Sanctae-Helenae. London: John Van Voorst, Paternoster Row 1877
[2] Howard Mendel; Philip Ashmole; Myrtle Ashmole: Invertebrates of the Central Peaks and Peak Dale, St. Helena. Report for the St Helena National Trust, Jamestown 2008

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edited: 02.12.2018