Osmia disjuncta known so far only from Mongolia also occurs in Europe

Osmia (Melanosmia) disjuncta was described by Tkalcu (1995) from Mongolia. In a recent paper published in Entomologisk Tidskrift (138, 25-32, 2017), Johansson & Paukkunen report this species also from central Sweden, central and northern Finland and the Kola peninsula in northern Russia. As no males have been discovered in Europe so far and the European females were found to slightly differ from the type specimens, there remained some uncertainty whether the European specimens indeed belong to Osmia disjuncta or whether they might represent a new species. However, material collected by T. Levchenko in Moscow province recently revealed typical males of Osmia disjuncta, indicating that this species is indeed a member of the European bee fauna. Further material kindly provided by T. Levchenko and J. Smit revealed the occurrence of Osmia disjuncta in western and eastern Siberia as well. Thus, Osmia disjuncta is distributed from Scandinavia over northern and central Russia to Mongolia.



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