West Texas is defined by its frontier character. Even today, we sense we might still encounter the unexpected in this unforgiving land.
Scientifically, it’s the reality. There are untold creatures here yet to be discovered. Many are apt to go unnoticed – like the weevils of West Texas.
Robert Anderson, a senior research scientist at the Canadian Museum of Nature, has journeyed from South America to Southeast Asia studying this group of insects. And in our region, he’s discovered creatures previously unknown to science, including some found nowhere else on Earth.
“If you were to point out 20 different species in your yard, chances are pretty good that one or two of them are weevils,” Anderson said. “To me, that's a pretty impressive subset of world biodiversity.”
If we consider them at all, we’re likely to think of weevils as agricultural pests. But weevils are pollinators; they break down organic matter; they’re at the base of the food chain. And, as Anderson notes, they’re ubiquitous: One out of every 20 known organisms is a weevil.
But what are they? Well, weevils are beetles. But they’re distinguished from their kin by “rostrums” – long snouts with chewing mouthparts at the end.
A female weevil uses her rostrum to chew through a nut or other protective shell around a seed. She deposits her eggs within, then seals the hole. When they hatch, the larvae have protection, moisture and food.
Anderson took his first trip to Big Bend National Park in 1988, as a newly minted PhD. He went to the base of Cattail Falls. When it rains in the Chisos Basin, water pours out here through the park’s famous Window, and Anderson went to rooting around in the lush undergrowth.
“And so I crawled in there,” Anderson said, “went in and ended up coming out with some leaf litter that I sorted through – and I got a single specimen of what was obviously a new species.”
He named the weevil for longtime Big Bend staffer Carl “Mike” Fleming. Leptopinara flemingi was subsequently found above the falls, at the Window itself – but this niche is the animal’s entire range.
Anderson later discovered another new species on the park’s Lost Mine Trail – that weevil has since been found elsewhere in the Southwest. He explored the Davis and Guadalupe mountains – and identified new species in those Texas sky islands. Anderson has also discovered previously unknown weevils in the desert lowlands.
And the West Texas plains have their surprises. In 2016, a retired colleague showed Anderson some unusual specimens he’d collected at McKenzie Lake, an hour north of Midland in Gaines County. Anderson traveled there – and spotted the weevil walking along the dry lake’s sandy margin.
“And it turned out not just to be a new species,” Anderson said. “It was a new genus, the next level up. It was something that we'd never, ever seen before.”
This species is about a half inch long – “big for a weevil,” Anderson said – and black in color, with patterned gray scales. It’s since been identified in a similarly sandy locale near Portales, New Mexico.
Anderson and his colleagues aren’t at risk of running out of projects. Of an estimated 220,000 weevil species, fewer than 80,000 have been identified. But then, it’s thought that only a fifth of species on Earth have been described by science.
Anderson plans to continue the work of discovery in West Texas.
“I'm hopeful that I'll be able to take future trips down there,” Anderson said, “and explore further and get into some more interesting and new areas and try some new techniques.”
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