PROCEEDINGS OF THE UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 
issued 
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION 
U. S. NATIONAL MUSEUM 
Vol. 97 Washington : 1947 No. 3213 
THE STAPHYLINID BEETLES OF THE CAYMAN 
ISLANDS 
By Ricuarp E. BLackwELpER 
Tue Oxford University Biological Expedition to the Cayman Is- 
lands (1938) collected several hundred beetles of the family Staphy- 
linidae in the course of extensive light-trap operations. The specimens 
were made available to me through the kindness of C. B. Lewis, one 
of the collectors for the expedition and now of the Institute of Jamaica, 
and Prof. G. D. Hale Carpenter, of Oxford University. It was orig- 
inally intended to include these records in my “Monograph of the 
West Indian Beetles of the Family Staphylinidae,”? but through an 
oversight records of only three of the species appeared therein. The 
present report includes the 18 species taken by the Expedition and the 
two previously reported from the Caymans. 
The Staphylinidae of the Cayman Islands must be assumed to be 
very imperfectly known at the present time. It is to be expected that 
intensive collecting in various habitats would produce at least 50 
species. For example, the three West Indian species of Cafius prob- 
ably occur on the beaches, and others of the widespread species un- 
doubtedly will be found. The present state of our knowledge there- 
fore presents little that may be used in studying the geographical rela- 
tionships or the origin of the fauna. In general, however, the species 
are among those which would be expected to occur. The only excep- 
tions are one known otherwise only from Antigua in the Lesser Antilles 
and one known otherwise only from the United States. The first of 
1U. S. Nat. Mus. Bull. 182, 658 pp. 1943. 
117 
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