Working Group on Iberian Lucanidae (GTLI)

Justification and objectives
Abusive collection and trade have been included among the list of reasons for the population decrease of some invertebrate species (Pyle et al., 1980), including the Stag Beetle, Lucanus cervus (Sánchez Vaquero, 1983). Although this species is not included in CITES, in the United Kingdom its trade is forbidden (Percy et al., 2000).

However, quantitative information about this topic seems to be completely lacking. Being a sensible topic, it is difficult to get direct information from entomologists. Some of them are maybe affraid of recognizing any capture they have done of L. cervus, in case this could cause them legal problems. Because collection could become a mith as a conservation problem, without any solid basis, it is the interest of all parts to get hard facts about its occurrence and importance.

The objectives ot this project are to answer to the following questions:

• ¿Is really any collection of L. cervus for sale?
• ¿Which are the channels for such trade -people, shops-?
• ¿Which is the magnitude of this trade -number of people or shops involved; number of insects sold per year-?
• ¿Is it really a good business? ¿How much does a L. cervus cost?

Results
The information gather along the last few years is now summarized in a tentative dossier (only in Spanish). Its quality is not very good but it provides a first impression about this lippery topic.

How to collaborate
GTLI will provide to those people interested detailed instructions about this project.

Information about any of the questions above can be sent to GTLI contact addresses.

References

Percy, C.; Bassford, G.; Keeble, V. & Robb, C. (2000). Findings of the 1998 national Stag Beetle survey. People’s Trust for Endangered Species, Londres.

Pyle, R.; Bentzien, M. & Opler, P. 1981. Insect conservation. Annu. Rev. Entomol. 26: 233-258.

Sánchez Vaquero, J. 1983. El coleccionismo de insectos está provocando la regresión de algunas especies. Quercus 11: 28.