The above map, with it four dots, shows the four counties in which a Phlugis species has been documented to occur in Florida. It also offers a chance to retell the sequence of events that document the spread of Phlugis from its initial discovery in Davie, Broward County (lower east-coast dot) on 13Jun2013. The next discovery was by Vince Golia, who was running two light traps overlooking the Everglades in Wellington, Palm Beach County (upper east-coast dot). These traps captured a female Phlugis on 19Jul2017 and a male on 12Sep2017. Vince pinned the two specimens and correctly identified them as Phlugis by finding similar images on the Web. When Vince contributed the specimens to FSCA, Kyle Schnepp made auto montage images of the two specimens (see images 2-6 on SINA’s page for Phlugis sp.).
On 2Aug2019 Joseph Montes de Oca, a prolific photographer who had posted thousands of photographs of living organisms on iNaturalist, posted five images of a male Phlugis taken in Collier County, Florida. In addition to the images of the male, he included a photo of the habitat in which the male Phlugis was photographed (see image 9 on SINA’s Phlugis sp. page). This may have been the first photograph of a habitat housing abundant Florida Phlugis sp.
The next images of Florida Phlugis came from Archbold Biological Station near the southern border of Highlands County (north-most dot). On the night of 17Oct2019, well north of the Everglades, a group of Yale students were catching insects coming to light at the Station. Joining the students (to collect beetles), rayray (iNaturalist posting) saw a student collecting a female Phlugis but kept looking for beetles. When he later learned of the significance of a Phlugis being collected at Archbold, he solicited a photograph of the pinned specimen (see image 10).
The next confirmations of Florida Phlugis are by eridanxharahi in Davie, Broward Co.:
iNaturalist posting [29Mar2020, SW21st Ave & SW36th Ct.: 2 juv];
iNaturalist posting [5Apr2020, S.Flamingo Rd & SW36th Ct.: 1 ♂];
iNaturalist posting [5Apr2020, S.Flamingo Rd & SW36th Ct.: 3 juv];
iNaturalist posting [11Apr2020, S.Flamingo Rd: 1 juv];
iNaturalist posting [11Apr2020, S.Flamingo Rd: 1 juv];
iNaturalist posting [25Apr2020, Lee Rd.: 1 ♀, Boynton Beach, Palm Beach Co.]
Eridanxharahi was first to visit multiple sites with the evident intent of increasing what was known of Florida Phlugis and the first to make photographs of juveniles. This map shows where eridanxharahi photographed Phlugis.