Is Ptinus sexpunctatus Panzer (Ptlnidae) becoming more common as a result of (bee hotels' in gardens?

摘要

Since taking on the job of County Recorder Coleoptera, for the Suffolk Naturalists' Society, following the untimely death of David Ridley Nash (Cuming, 2014), the previous incumbent, I have been surprised by the number of records of Ptinus sexpunctatus Panzer that I have received. The majority have been sent by interested general naturalists who are not coleopterists. Mostly, the records have been associated with what are variously sold as 'bee hotels', 'bug and bee houses', etc. by garden centres. These range from lumps of wood with holes drilled in them to bundles of short lengths of bamboo, or similar, the common feature being lots of holes of different dimensions. They attract nesting solitary bees, leafcutter bees Megachile spp. and mason bees Osmia spp., in particular, which in turn attract P. sexpunctatus (Fig. 1) and, undoubtedly, other inquilines. The beetles are often noticed when the contraptions are cleaned out at the end of the season, as in the photograph, where over fifty beetles were found in a single 'bee hotel' at Saxmundham, Suffolk (John Heald, in lit.).