Satansbos (Satan's Bush) Leaf Beetle
Leptinotarsa texana Schaeffer
(Coleoptera: Chrysomelidae: Chrysomelinae)

Diagnostics:

Useful Web Links:

• Natural distribution from Southern Texas to Mexico
• Introduced to South Africa together with Leptinotarsa defecta (Stål) as biological control agents for the control of their main host,
  Solanum elaeagnifolium - the silver leafed nightshade

• Primary host: Solanum elaeagnifolium (nightshade)


• Secondary hosts: Solanum dulcamara, S. carolinense, S. rostratum, S. melongena

• Arnett RH, 1985. American Insects: A Handbook of the Insects of America North of Mexico. New York, USA: Van Nostrand Reinhold.
• Crop Protection Compendium, CABI, ISSN 1478-7040 (Online), ISSN 1365-9065 (CD-ROM)
• Hsiao, T. (1986) Specificity of Certain Chrysomelid Beetles for Solanaceae. In Solanaceae: Biology and Systematics, Second International Symposium. Columbia University Press, New York, pp.345-363.
• Jacques, R.J. Jr. (1988): The Potato Beetles: The Genus Leptinotarsa in North America; Flora & Fauna Handbooks No. 3.E.J. Brill. 144.pp.
• Klein, H (2002) The satanbos leaf beetles (Leptinotarsa texana and Leptinotarsa defecta) ARC PPRI Leaflet Series 4.2
• Oleckers, T et al (1999) The initation of biological control programmes against Solanum eleagnifolium, Cavanilles and S. sisymbrifolium Lamarck (Solanaceae) in South Africa, African Entomology Memoir No 1: 55-63.
• Oleckers, T and Zimmermann, HG (1991) Biological control of silverleaf nightshade, Solanum eleagnifolium, and bugweed, Solanum mauritanum, (Solanaceae) in South Africa.

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