A first report of dung beetle Garreta smaragdifer (Walker, 1858) attending the faecal matter of Northern Plain Gray Langur Semnopithecus entellus (Dufresne, 1997) with range extension and a checklist of the genus Garreta Janssen, 1940

: Genus Garreta Janssens, 1940 is an Afrotropical and of Oriental origin, consisting of 25 species and two subspecies from the world, eight species from India and two species from Maharashtra. Out of eight Indian species two are endemic to India. The present report is the first report of feeding of Garreta smaragdifer (Walker, 1858) on the faecal matter of Northern Plain Gray Langur Semnopithecus entellus (Dufresne, 1997) and also its range extension from central India to Maharashtra.

ISSN 0974-7907 (Online); ISSN 0974-7893 (Print) Zídek 2018) from the world including 8 from India (Mittal 2011;Chandra & Gupta 2014). The Asian species of this genus have been revised by Pokorny & Zidek (2016) and the African species by Pokorny & Zidek (2018). In their revision, they clearly state that describing species in this genus based on the colours is not valid. The colour changes in this group are due to the temperature induced effect, they further state that the species distributed in the warmer regions are greenish-bluish in temperate regions and coppery in intermediate climatic conditions.
The species in this genus look similar and to delineate the species, recently in Afrotropical species, the microsculpture of the exoskeleton was used as an important character for differentiation by Moretto & Génier (2015) who divided some species into two species groups based on micro-sculpture and geographical distribution, i.e., Garreta laetus group and included three species, namely: G. caffer Fåhraeus, 1857, G. laetus (Hope, 1842), and G. nyassicus (Kolbe, 1897). In Garreta nitens group G. nitens (Olivier, 1789), G. rutilans (Castelnau 1840), and G. wahlbergi (Fåhraeus, 1857) have been included. The other species have not been included in any species group so far. In the present study, two infraspecific taxa, namely, G. laetus laetus (Hope, 1842) and G. laetus olivaceus (Quedenfeldt, 1884) have been considered valid (see Moretto & Génier 2015).

MATERIAL AND METHODS
The observation taken on the G. smaragdifer was opportunistic from the Gautala-Autramghat Wildlife Sanctuary, Maharashtra during a faunistic survey tour to the region from 9-18 August 2021. A few specimens were collected for identification in the laboratory. The specimens were hand-picked and kept in a vial of 70 percent ethyl alcohol. Leica EZ4E stereomicroscope with photographic facility was used for examining the specimens. The specimen was identified using available literature (Chandra & Gupta 2014;Pokorny & Zidek 2016). The distribution and the type locality data have been verified from Janssens (1940), Chandra & Gupta (2014), Pokorny & Zídek (2018), and Zídek (2018). The map of the collection locality was prepared using open, free access QGIS software version 3.16 ( Figure 1). The material examined was deposited in the national repository of Zoological Survey of India, Western Regional Centre, Pune, Maharashtra, India (ZSI-WRC).  (Dufresne, 1997). Large troops of the langur were seen hopping on the Hardwickia binata Roxb. trees present in the Patnadevi part of the sanctuary and around the Bhaskaracharya Forest Guest house during the day time. Near the guest house it was observed that the fresh dung of the langur was rolled and carried by the large number of G. smaragdifer, who were busy in rolling and fighting for the dung in the day time. The langur was identified by the mammal expert and the second author. Some of the beetles were collected and brought to the laboratory for further study and to our surprise it was identified as G. smaragdifer, a new record for Maharashtra whose range extended from central India to Maharashtra. The aim of this paper is to provide a first report of the Dung Beetle G. smaragdifer attending the faecal matter of a primate species from India and also its range extension from Maharashtra.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
First instance, on 12 August 2021, we observed a large troop of langurs near the Kedarkund area (20.309N & 74.967E; 447 m) very close to the water falls, about 4 km from the Bhaskaracharya Forest Rest House ( Figure  1). The entire forest floor was covered with the shiny bluish-green dung beetles, either rolling or devouring the faecal matters of the langur (Image 1). As many as 80 beetles were counted during the survey. The next day, a similar emergence of dung beetles was noticed all along within the campus of the Bhaskracharya Forest Rest House (20.318N & 74.975E; 468 m), where a small roost of about 15 langurs was seen. A total of more than 100 beetles were encountered during the period. All were actively rolling the very meagre faecal matters underneath the tree. Some of them were fighting for the dung balls. This is a common practice where male dung beetles fight for the dung pad with other males. Both the days were exceptionally wet and the weather was slightly overcast with a light drizzle.
Various reports suggest that a dung ball is rolled away from the dung for brood construction by a single beetle, or by a pair and buried in the soil (Prasse 1957). An egg is laid at its base, and is covered with dung in the chamber making a brood. This brood is then coated with a mixture of soil and dung to prevent fungal attack (Scholtz et al. 2009). The Garreta brood is generally oval in shape. We also noticed slightly oval shaped brood balls all along the locality.
The other primate species observed during the survey was the Rhesus Macaque Macaca mulatta   , 1758), and Jungle Cat Felis chaus Schreber, 1777 were also found during the survey. It was observed in the field that faecal matters of these animals were not attended to by G. smaragdifer.
Most scarabs prefer to feed on herbivore faecal matter, which are largely undigested plant matter, rather than carnivore faecal matters, which hold very little nutritional value for insects (Hadley 2021). According to Al-Houty & Musalam (1997) the faecal matter of herbivorous mammals was more preferred than the carnivores. There are many studies on the dung beetles attending on the dungs of elephants (Sabu et al. 2006), Gaur (Vinod & Sabu 2007), cattle species (Tonelli et al. 2021) from India. There are reports of dung beetles attending on the scats of carnivorous animals too (Al-Houty & Musalam 1997). Even though studies were reported on the faecal matters of primates from other countries (Estrada & Coates-Estrada 1991) so far there were none from India. Hence, the present report forms the first instance of dung beetles on the dungs of primate species from India and also reporting the beetle species G. smaragdifer for the first time from Maharashtra State.