Natural History Museums in Sweden have thousands of curated specimens and include Sweden’s largest holdings of Mutilla europaea Linnaeus, 1758 (Insecta, Hymenoptera, Mutillidae). The present survey recorded 216 specimens of M. europaea in eight different major museums, collected from the 18^th century to the present day, representing an invaluable source of historical biodiversity data. This work aims to create a guide to all datasets of museum collections of M. europaea created within the GBIF initiative, revealing the geographical distribution and frequency of the species in southern Sweden.

Database, GBIF, insect collection, Scandinavia

Sweden has a strong entomological tradition and large quantities of insects have been collected for a long time. Many of these specimens now belong to museums all over the country. These vast collections are the result of nearly 300 years of collecting (NRM 2024). Scientific collections are museums’ key to successful research, international collaboration and live exhibitions, serving as sources of biological data for scientists, educators, and the general public (Bradley et al. 2014). Preserving and valorizing the scientific, cultural and historical value of the collections represent the core mission of museums.

GBIF (Global Biodiversity Information Facility) is a central organization focusing on biodiversity informatics and biodiversity data. Its aim is to ensure reliable access to information and data on biodiversity worldwide. GBIF is a global infrastructure that unites researchers, authorities and organizations worldwide to achieve this goal. The major Swedish natural history museums are associated to GBIF.

The Swedish collections of Hymenopteran species are now a large archive of individuals collected by people in different parts of the country over many decades. Insect collections can be used in researches about rare species that are difficult to study in the field and also in studies over longer time series that extend far back in time. However, it can be difficult to know in which collections all specimens are found. Museums often do not provide complete lists of the specimens in their collections despite increased digitization efforts, thus making it difficult to make data available to the scientific community. This project’s dataset focuses on the large velvet ant Mutilla europaea, Linnaeus 1758 (Hymenoptera: Mutillidae), documenting its occurrence and distribution in Swedish museum collections. Mutilla europaea is a wasp showing strong sexual dimorphism. The females are wingless and terrestrial while the males are winged. The males fly during summer when they also pollinate plants. The females are bumblebee (Bombus spp.) nest parasites: after mating, they lay their eggs in Bombus spp. nests (Brothers et al. 2000). The distribution of the species outside Sweden includes most of Europe (including the European part of Russia, South Ural, Western Siberia), North Africa, Asia: Kazakhstan, Turkey (Lelej and Schmid-Egger 2005) and as far east as Japan.

The survey dealt with the museum collections that have the largest insect collections in Sweden, i.e. National Museum of Natural History in Stockholm (NRM), the National Museum of Natural History in Gothenburg (GNM), the Biological Museum in Lund (BMIL) and the Museum of Evolution in Uppsala (EMIU). The collection in the Biological Museum in Lund is the largest one. The survey covered also a number of smaller but still significant collections, i.e., Helsingborgs museum (HM), Malmö museum (MM), Vänersborgs museum (VM) and Sveriges lantbruksuniversitet (SLU), which manages the Veterinary Museum in Skara, which has its collection of insects in the Ecology Center in Uppsala. A dataset was then created and added to the datasets available through GBIF.

Data set name: Map of specimens in the largest museum collection in Sweden (this link is not publicly accessible and requires user registration).

Map: https://www.gbif.org/occurrence/download?country=SE&dataset_key=b23c2479-214f-4160-9f98-bd3831ab131b&dataset_key=4508bed1-d45d-4a2d-9790-34cc99ee8cce&dataset_key=2356f899-6244-4bbb-aa33-50e29132e86a&taxon_key=4506278&advanced=1.

Filter used:

• “DatasetKey is one of (Lund University Biological Museum - Insect collections Specimens, Entomological Collection (GNM), Lund University Biological Museum - Insect collections Inventory)”,
• “TaxonKey is Mutilla europaea Linnaeus, 1758”

The survey focused exclusively on M. europaea found in the Hymenoptera Museum collections. The author trusted the identification labels because there are no other Mutilla species in Sweden. A frequency map and a distribution map (Alpha 200) of sites from which M. europaea has been confirmed were built using the Swedish Agricultural University’s (SLU) database Artdatabanken (https://www.analysisportal.se) based on grid statistics. Those maps contain all records from Sweden collected during the survey.

The collections of the surveyed museums contained a total of 216 specimen from Sweden (Table 1) (189 pinned and 27 glued), distributed over a time span of 150 years, from the 1870s until the 2020s (Fig. 1). The surveyed collections of M. europaea are in good condition and offer a good reference base for researches. A total of 138 specimens had complete data with year and locality that can be used to confirm the species distribution and frequency in Sweden (Figs 2, 3).

Remarks on some of the surveyed specimens and on the examined collections

Among the surveyed collections are some of the oldest entomological collections in the world. BMIL collection has its origins in the early 18^th century, holding the entomological collection of Johan Leche (1704–1764) and the collection of Kilian Stobaeus, donated to the museum in 1735 (Kilian Stobaeus is best known as the teacher of Linné during the year he lived in Lund, 1727–28). This collection is considered the second oldest insect collection in the world (Zoologiska Museet i Lund 2024). The historical collection found in EMIU was collected by Linnaeus’ former disciple Carl Peter Thunberg (however, it is not certain that the specimens of M. europaea found in that collection come from Sweden (pers. comm. Mejlon H. Museum curator EMIU 2023-12-20)).

Some ambiguities exist such as a specimen (No. 63 in Appendix 1) in GNM labelled “Kullabo” but there are three Kullabo in Sweden and it is impossible to know which is the real location today. Three specimens in RNM (No. 4, 5 and 6 in Appendix 1) were labelled “Karup” but it is not known if it is the South or the North Karup.

Stellan Erlandsson wrote a paper in which he listed all documented finds of M. europaea he knew (Erlandsson 1964). During the survey four additional specimens identified by Erlandsson in 1971 were found in SLU, Ekologicentrum (No. 202, 203, 204 and 205 in Appendix 1).

The individuals in HM were collected by Cecilia Andersson. Cecilia Andersson was a diligent collector of insects, especially butterflies and beetles, and can be counted as the first woman in Sweden who was an active insect collector. The specimens lack the date of collection, the collecting locality is Båstad (Fig. 5). Cecilia Andersson lived in Båstad during the period 1906–1917 and it is therefore probably that the insects from Båstad were collected during that period (pers. comm. Hansen HR. Museum curator HM 2024-01-08)).

Figure 1. 

Number of specimens of M. europaea in the collections distributed over each decade from 1870 to 2019.

Figure 2. 

Distribution map of M. europaea in Sweden based on the surveyed collections.

Figure 3. 

Frequency map of M. europaea in Sweden based on the surveyed collections.

Table 1.

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The number of M. europaea in insect collections in Swedish museums.

Museum	Number of specimen	Females	Males
National Museum of Natural History, Stockholm	49	29	20
National Museum of Natural History, Gothenburg	59	50	9
Biological Museum at Lund University	70	46	24
Museum of Evolution, Uppsala	19	8	11
SLU, Ekologicentrum	11	9	2
Vänersborgs Museum	5	3	2
Helsingborgs Museum	2	2	0
Malmö Museum	1	1	0

Figure 4. 

Mutilla europaea determined by Dr. Erlandsson.

Figure 5. 

Mutilla europaea collected by Cecilia Andersson, glued specimens. Photo: Hasse Römer Hansen.

Some other notable specimens

Some specimens have a scientific value higher than others. For instance, the two specimens collected in Östergötland county (Fig. 6) (No. 104 and 105 in Appendix 1) are the only known individuals recorded in the county apart from one literature record (Hedström 1985). Unfortunately, their labels are difficult to interpret and it is only possible to decipher ÖG, which is the abbreviation for Östergötland.

There are many black males of M. europaea in Eastern and Central Europe but only one black male collected in Sweden exists (Fig. 7). It was recorded in Steneby, Dalsland in Västra Götalands County and belongs to BMIL (No. 133 in Appendix 1).

During the survey it was possible to find a specimen probably corresponding to the literature record contained in the old inventory of insects made by Henning Nordenström partly during the 1870s and partly in 1896–99 where a finding of M. europaea is mentioned (Nordenström 1900). The individual listed by Nordenström was found in Odensjö and it could possibly be a specimen in RNM that was captured in Odensjö 1896 (collector unknown) (No. 1 in Appendix 1) (Fig. 8).

Figure 6. 

The two specimen of M. europaea from Östergötlands county with label data difficult to decipher.

Figure 7. 

The only black male in the surveyed collections.

Figure 8. 

The specimen captured in Odensjö 1896.

Mutilla europaea is a relatively rare species in Sweden and the creation of a database of records for this species, by using the important collections of Swedish natural history museums, provides researchers with an important tool for extracting data useful for studies on the species conservation, systematics, biogeography, ecology and biology. The inclusion of the M. europaea database in the Swedish node of GBIF, ‘GBIF Sweden’, will provide the world community of scientists the access to several different types of data such as metadata, species lists or checklists and species observations for research on M. europaea.

I would like to thank the museum curators Hege Vårdal (NRM), Charlotte Jonsson (GNM), Christoffer Fägerström (BMIL), Hans Mejlon (EMIU), Mats Jonsell, (SLU), Ann-Charlott Öberg (VM), Hasse Römer Hansen (HM) and Jonny Strand (MM) for granting access to the collections under their care and for providing useful information.

This appendix contains a list of all specimens of Mutilla europaea that were found in Sweden from 1850–2020 and which today are part of the eight largest historical insect collections in museums in Sweden (all them now part of the database accessible through GBIF).

Figure A1. 

Country occurrence.