A Study On The Classification Of Chinese

Rugilus is a genus of the subtribe Paederinae in the family Staphylinidae. Most of them are predatory on small invertebrates and of significant importance to the forest ecological system.The genus was established by Leach in 1819 and type species is Staphylinus orbiculatus Paykull. Up to the present, 268 species of Rugilus have been known from all the zoogeographical regions of the world, among which, 31 species are from China(30 from Mainland, 3 from Taiwan and 2 from both Mainland and Taiwan). About ten authors have studied the Chinese fauna of the group, but our knowledge concerning the genus is still far from adequate.In the present study, about 820 specimens were collected from various nature reserves of China and examined. The result is summarized as follows:1. It is the first systematic works of the genus Rugilus of China.2. In this paper, 20 species of the genus are recorded, of which, 4 are described as new: Rugilus(Eurystilicus) nabanhensis sp. nov., Rugilus(Rugilus) tangliangi sp. nov., Rugilus(Rugilus) huanghaoi sp. nov. and Rugilus(Rugilus) ziweii sp. nov. One is new to China: Rugilus(Rugilus) malaisei(Scheerpeltz). One is new to Mainland China: Rugilus(Eurystilicus) japonicus Watanabe. All the species are described and illustrated with habitus and sexual characters in detail, together with their histories, collecting data and distributions.3. A key to the subgenera and species of Chinese Rugilus, and a catalog of Rugilus of the world are given.4. A database of all the known species of the world is built.