Rare grasshoppers (Orthoptera, Acridoidea) of the Baraba and Kulunda steppes (South Siberia)

Abstract

The first list of the rare grasshoppers of the Baraba and Kulunda steppes is presented. Two sets of distribution data are compared: (1) for the first half of 20th century and (2) for 1972–2019. A series of digital maps was generated by MapInfo 12.03. The distribution patterns of several species, namely Asiotmethis muricatus (Pallas), Notostaurus albicornis (Eversmann), Eremippus simplex (Eversmann), Myrmeleotettix antennatus (Fieber), Gomphocerippus rufus (Linnaeus), Mesasippus arenosus (Bey-Bienko), Mecostethus parapleurus (Hagenbach), Locusta migratoria Linnaeus, did not change significantly. Four taxa (Asiotmethis jubatus (Uvarov), Arcyptera fusca (Pallas), Stenobothrus carbonarius (Eversmann), Sphingonotus coerulipes Uvarov) were relatively often in the first half of 20th century and nowadays they are extremely rare. Two species, namely Megaulacobothrus aethalinus (Zubovsky) and Aeropedellus variegatus (Fischer de Waldheim), were recently found near the south-eastern and north-eastern boundaries of the region respectively. There are also the type localities of Asiotmethis jubatus and Mesasippus arenosus in the Kulunda steppe.