Ips typographus, male frons
Ips typographus, female frons
Ips typographus, female frons
Ips typographus, elytral disc
Ips typographus, male declivity
Ips typographus, male lateral habitus

Scientific Name

Ips typographus (Linnaeus, 1758)

Synonyms

Bostrichus octodentatus Paykull, 1800

Ips japonicus Niisima, 1909

Common names: Eight-toothed spruce bark beetle (English); Buchdrucker, grosser 8-zähniger Fichtenborkenkäfer (German); Typographe, grand scolyte de l'épicea (French); Granbarkbille (Norwegian)

Diagnostic notes

-Elytral declivity with four spines per side
-Differs from all Eurasian Ips species by its dull elytral declivity (except in rare shiny specimens) and impunctate interstriae on the basal third of elytral disc (bases of interstriae 2 and 3).
-Differs from the morphologically similar Himalayan species, North American spruce-feeding species and I. woodi by presence of frons central tubercle.
-Differs from I. knausi by its non emarginate spine 3 and from female I. plastographus by its petiolate or nearly parallel-sided spines (evenly tapered in I. plastographus females).

Morphological Summary

sexes combined
Body. 4.0-5.0 mm long, 2.3-2.5 times longer than wide; pronotum 1.0-1.1 times longer than wide.
Head. Epistomal margin with uniseriate row of tubercles with gap at midline. Frons outline convex in lateral view; vestiture fine (not hiding part of integument); surface sculpture near epistoma densely tuberculate-punctate or with isolated tubercles; central carina absent; central tubercle present and single, separated from base of epistomal setae by 0.5-4(-5) tubercle diameters, without pair of circular tubercles on either side of midline; transverse carina absent; frons central fovea present or absent; circular tubercles above top of eyes present - up to, or more than one third of all tubercles. Vertex and pronotum without stridulatory apparatus (pars stridens). Antennal club sutures bisinuate.
Prothorax. Protibiae with three socketed teeth on apical half (does not include apical spine).
Elytra. Interstriae impunctate or punctate (observed on interstriae 2 and 3 on middle third of elytral disc), punctures 0.3(-0.4) times diameter of adjacent strial punctures (punctures and striae measured at steepest part of puncture wall), interstrial setae longer than width of scutellar shield, interstriae 3-5 times as wide as adjacent striae. Elytral declivity with four spines per side, spine 3 largest; spine 1 (largest on 2nd interstria) closer to spine 2 than suture or suture than spine 2; spines 1 and 2 separated at base by distance greater than height of spine 1; spine 2 closer to spine 1 than spine 3 or 3 than spine 1; spine 3 pedunculate (capitate), rarely straight sided with tapered apex, apex acute or right-angled, with apical half symmetrical or asymmetrical in lateral view; spines 2 and 3 not on shared tumescence, in line with spines 1 and 4 (posterodorsal view); declivital integument mat, rarely shiny.

Geographic Distribution

Algeria; Austria; Belgium; Bosnia-Herzegovina; Bulgaria; Belarus; Croatia; China (Heilongjiang, Henan, Inner Mongolia, Jilin, Qinghai, Sichuan, Shaanxi, Xinjiang); Czechia; Denmark; Estonia; Finland; France; Germany; Great Britain; Greece; Hungary; Iceland (introduced); Ireland; Italy; Japan; Kazakhstan; Latvia; Liechtenstein; Lithuania; Luxembourg; Moldova; Mongolia; Montenegro; North Korea; Poland; Portugal; Romania; Russia: throughout; Serbia; South Korea; Slovakia; Slovenia; Spain; Sweden; Switzerland; Turkey; Ukraine.

Hosts

Picea (also Abies, Pinus, Larix)

Notes

Sister species to I. nitidus (Cognato and Sun 2007).

References

Cognato, A.I.2015. Biology, systematics, and evolution of Ips. In Bark beetles: biology and ecology of native and invasive species. Edited by F.E. Vega and R.W. Hofstetter. Elsevier, San Diego, California. Pp. 351–370.

Cognato, A.I. and Sun, J.H. 2007. DNA based cladograms augment the discovery of a new Ips species from China (Coleoptera: Curculionidae: Scolytinae). Cladistics, 23: 539–551.

EPPO. No date. Data Sheets on Quarantine Pests: Ips typographus. European and Mediterranean Plant Protection Organization. 

Grüne, S. 1979. Brief illustrated key to European bark beetles. Hannover, Germany, M. and H. Schaper.

Knížek M. 2011. Scolytinae. In Catalogue of Palaearctic Coleoptera, Vol. 7. Edited by I. Löbl and A. Smetana. Apollo Books, Stenstrup, Denmark,  Pp. 204–251.

Internet resources

http://www.padil.gov.au/pests-and-diseases/pest/main/135618