European scientists gather for glimpse of rare beetle

SCIENTISTS FROM across Europe are gathering in Kilfenora, Co Clare, this weekend hoping to catch a glimpse of one of the world’s rarest creatures.

The Octhebius nilssoni, a tiny water beetle, is only found in two locations worldwide: the Burren and a lake in the Västerbotten province of northern Sweden.

The State’s National Biodiversity Data Centre, which monitors Irish wildlife species, is organising the event which has attracted 30 coleopterists (scientists who study beetles) from Ireland, England, Germany, the Netherlands, Scotland, Spain and Sweden.

The meeting organiser, Stephen McCormack, said the new species was discovered in 1986 in Sweden by Prof Anders Nilsson. He is among those travelling to Ireland along with British scientist, Prof Garth Foster who found the beetle in 2006 in two lakes in the Burren – Lough Gealáin and Lough Briskeen.

Mr McCormack said the “particularly small creature, which grows to a length of just 1.5mm, doesn’t swim and needs cold, clear, well-oxygenated water in limestone lakes to survive” and was “especially sensitive to environmental conditions”. He explained that because the beetle is unknown in Britain “it has not been given an English name” but has been christened as the “Ciarógín Bán” because “it is black with lots of white hairs”. The aquatic insect has been accorded the “official” Latin name of Octhebius nilssoni in honour of Prof Nilsson’s discovery.

There are 250 different species of water beetle in Ireland. Coleopterists often accord the creatures slightly jocular names such as the "The Chummier Australian" ( Chaetarthria seminulu); "The Artist" (Gyrinus urinator); and "The Wrinkled Brow" ( Helophorus strigifrons).

The scientists cheerfully acknowledge that coleopterology may seem like the less glamorous branch of entomology (the study of insects) and accept that water beetles suffer from a “ lack of aesthetic appeal”. Mr McCormack said coleopterists “occasionally get accosted by curious members of the public” when out collecting samples. “A net-wielding Englishman” was arrested in Co Galway in 1928 and mistakenly assumed to be “obviously an escaped lunatic”. But Mr McCormack claimed “we’re not quite as odd as the butterfly chasers”.