MONOGRAPH OF THE WEST INDIAN BEETLES 

 OF THE FAMILY STAPHYLINIDAE 



By Richard E. Biii^CKWELDER 



INTRODUCTION 



For many years the West Indian Islands have been a place of 

 unusual interest to American naturalists and those of many other 

 countries as well. The list of entomologists who have studied the 

 insects of the West Indies is long, and several of our large museums 

 have sponsored such studies. The Smithsonian Institution, through 

 the Walter Rathbone Bacon Scholarship and other means, has con- 

 ducted several investigations of the fauna of the islands, but until 

 the present study was undertaken none had been concerned with the 

 insects of that region. The Walter Rathbone Bacon Scholarship 

 is administered by the Smithsonian Institution for the study of the 

 fauna of the regions outside of the United States, and in 1935 it was 

 awarded to me for the purpose of studying the Staphylinidae of 

 the West Indies. 



The program of study that was followed involved the collecting 

 of Staphylinidae on each of the islands from Cuba to Trinidad; 

 the examination of all local collections; the study of types in the 

 British Museum and the collection of Dr. Malcolm Cameron; the 

 mounting, labeling, and sorting of the collections assembled; the 

 identification of the species; and the preparation of a report, to in- 

 clude a systematic revision of the family as it occurs in the West 

 Indies. In pursuance of this plan, I spent 21 months in the islands 

 collecting specimens and data, a month in London studying types, 

 and 14 months at the United States National Museum preparing 

 and studying the collections. In addition, some time was spent on 

 the manuscript during 1938-40, and after my return to the Na- 

 tional Museum in July 1940, this paper occupied most of my time 

 for 12 months. 



The number of specimens of Staphylinidae collected was between 

 45,000 and 50,000. In addition to these, approximately 3,800 speci- 

 mens from the West Indies were examined in the British Museum, 

 over 400 in Dr. Cameron's collection, several hundred in the Ameri- 

 can Museum of Natural History, over 1,600 from the Museum of 



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