Australian Beetles Volume 1

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Morphology, Classification and Keys

Australian Beetles Series By: John F Lawrence, Adam Slipinski

eBook - October 2013 - eRetailers

Volume 1 in a three-volume series that represents a comprehensive treatment of the beetles of Australia.

This three-volume series represents a comprehensive treatment of the beetles of Australia, a relatively under-studied fauna that includes many unusual and unique lineages found nowhere else on Earth. + Full description

Volume 1 contains keys to all 117 beetle families found in Australia, and includes over 1100 illustrations of adults, larvae and anatomical structures. This volume is based in part on Lawrence & Britton’s out-of-print Australian Beetles, but is fully updated and expanded.

The biology and morphology for all major beetle lineages is described and illustrated, along with anatomical terms which clarify the characters and terminology used in the keys; few other resources for beetle identification include such a detailed morphological background. A chapter on the fossil record is also included, and family sections provide full descriptions of adults and larvae, including the world distribution of each family.

The revised identification keys (currently recognised as one of the most valuable keys worldwide) will aid quarantine agents, biologists and students in identifying members of the most species-rich order of animals.

- Short description

News

This title is no longer available in print, but can still be purchased as an eBook.

2014 Whitley Award Commendation for Taxonomic Zoology

Reviews

"This is a beautifully produced book with relevance beyond Australia. It is very clearly laid out and with a profusion of excellent and well-chosen illustrations."
Robert Angus, Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society, 2014, 171, pp. 226–231

"the present volume is an outstanding textbook of coleopterology and for many years will remain the bible for researchers interested in any aspect of Australian beetles."
Martin Baehr, Quarterly Review of Biology, March 2015, p. 101

Details

ePDF | October 2013
ISBN: 9780643097292
Publisher: CSIRO Publishing
Available from eRetailers

ePUB | October 2013
ISBN: 9780643106673
Publisher: CSIRO Publishing
Available from eRetailers

Features

An updated, expanded version of the popular, out-of-print Australian Beetles, with improved keys to all beetle families found in Australia, expanded family diagnoses as well as modern classification and additional illustrations.
The introduction to beetle morphology and anatomical terms clarify characters and terminology used in the keys; few other resources for beetle identification include such a detailed morphological background.

Preface
Acknowledgements
1. INTRODUCTION
Fossil History
Australian Beetles and Their Habitats
Collecting Beetles
Adult Morphology
Larval Morphology
Eggs
Pupae
Biology
Special Features of the Australian Fauna
2. CLASSIFICATION AND KEYS
Classification
List of Beetle Families
Adult Key
Larval Key
3. FAMILY TREATMENTS
References
Index

Authors

John F. Lawrence is one of the world’s preeminent coleopterists; he worked at Harvard University’s Museum of Comparative Zoology before emigrating to Australia, where he served as a Senior Principal Research Scientist at the Australian National Insect Collection (CSIRO) until 1999. He has published more than 200 research articles and book chapters and was co-editor of a recent volume of Handbook of Zoology and author or co-author of more than 50 chapters in that volume. John is now retired but continues to conduct research; he is a leading member of the Beetle Tree of Life project's morphological phylogenetics section.

Adam Slipinski completed his PhD and DSc in Poland where he worked for 20 years at the Museum and Institute of Zoology of the Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw and held a joint appointment as the professor of biology at the University of Zielona Gora teaching entomology and environmental biology. He is the author of over 100 research publications, editor of a two-volume book on the phylogeny and classification of beetles and an author of a book on Australian ladybird beetles. Adam’s research concentrates on the phylogeny and higher classification of beetles. With John Lawrence he is coordinating the morphological part of the Beetle Tree of Life project.