Until today there was no record of the presence of this beetle in the Balearic Islands.

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Natural Environment confirms the finding of the exotic and invasive beetle

The Conselleria de Agricultura, Pesca y Medio Natural, through the Servicio de Sanidad Forestal de la Dirección General de Medio Natural y Gestión Forestal, has confirmed the finding of the exotic and invasive beetle Gonipterus platensis on the island of Mallorca, specifically in the municipality of Alaró. Until today there was no record of the presence of this beetle in the Balearic Islands.

It is a small curculionid (5 centimetres long) that feeds throughout its life cycle on eucalyptus leaves. Its affection will be low since the eucalyptus is a tree rarely used in gardening and is not planted naturally in forest areas. This coleopteran is native to Tasmania (Australia), but has spread as an invasive species in New Zealand, South America (Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Colombia), the United States (California) and western Europe (Spain and Portugal).

The Forest Health Service collaborates with several industry experts to develop and disseminate scientific research. In this case, the authors of the study have been: Marc Mascaró, Antonio J. Velázquez De Castro, Luis Núñez and Josep M. Riba-Flinch. In addition, to disseminate the finding to a wider public, a scientific article entitled: “First detection of the eucalyptus weevil, Gonipterus platensis (Marelli, 1926) (Coleoptera: Curculionidae), in the Balearic Islands (Spain)”, published in the Bulletin No. 66 of the Balearic Society of Natural History (BSHNB) in November 2023.

It should be emphasized that this research is carried out because of the need to know in more depth the fauna of the forests of the Balearic Islands and, thus, to be able to control and detect from early stages the possible pathogenic organisms that can be introduced in the Archipelago. In recent years, the Forest Health Service has noted and published the presence of other insects such as: Ergates faber, Phoracanta semipuctata, Oobius rudnevi and Pterolepis pityusensis. The publication is available on the website sanitatforestal.caib.es.