Plagionotus detritus, a broadly distributed Euro-Turanian thermophilic species of primeval oak forests, has been described from "Europa" as Leptura detrita by Carl Linné in 1758 [❖]. It develops in deciduous trees, especially in oaks (Quercus spp.), also in hornbeam (Carpinus), beech (Fagus), chestnut tree (Castanea), et cetera. Larvae feed under (or in) the bark of sun-exposed standing or fallen trunks and thick branches. Life cycle 1 or two years. Adults, active from May to July, can be found on logs, fallen or standing dying/dead host trees [▽][✧].

Body length:	10 - 20 mm
Life cycle:	1 - 2 years
Adults in:	May - July
Host plant:	polyphagous in deciduous trees, in Central Europe prefers oaks (Quercus spp.)
Distribution:	Albania, Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belgium, Bosnia Herzegovina, Belarus, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czechia, England, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldavia, Nederland, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, Kazakhstan

The depicted living beetles were reared from larvae found under a thick bark of a dead standing oak (Quercus robur) trunks in Křivoklátsko Protected Landscape Area (Central Bohemia, Czechia) where the species is quite common.

Collected by Miroslav Polcar, Daniel Rydzi and David Navrátil

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[❖]
Linné C.:
Systema naturæ per regna tria naturæ secundum classes, ordines, genera, species, cum characteribus, differentiis, synonymis, locis.
Systema naturae (Editio 10) Laur. Salvius, Holmiae 1: 824pp [page 399], 1758. [download ]

[▽]
Vitali F.:
Atlas of the Insects of the Grand-Duchy of Luxembourg: Coleoptera, Cerambycidae.
Ferrantia, Musée national d’histoire naturelle, Luxembourg 79: 1-208 [pages 45-47], 2018. [download ]

[✧]
Sláma M.E.F.:
Tesaříkovití – Cerambycidae České republiky a Slovenské republiky.
[ Cerambycidae of the Czech Republic and Slovak Republic. ]
Milan Sláma private printing, Krhanice, 383pp [page 157-158], 1998 [ISBN: 80-238-2627-1]. [download ]