Iphiclus

Iphiclus is a large genus – possibly the most diverse – in the pleasing fungus beetle family (Erotylidae). This genus belongs to subfamily Erotylinae and occurs across the Neotropics. Its almost 300 named species are divided into several subgenera, whose monophyly (and validity), however, remains to be determined. Most of these beetles, as adults as well as larvae, feed on polypores (shelf fungi).

The genus name was established by Louis Chevrolat in 1837. Chevrolat's name was, however, overshadowed by the extensive study of Jean Théodore Lacordaire a few years later, who described most of the currently-known species and introduced the genus name Brachysphoenus. That genus name, or spelling variants thereof, was generally used by subsequent authors – namely in the seminal works on the genus by George Crotch in the mid-1870s, Henry Gorham in the late 1880s, Paul Kuhnt around 1910, Leopold Mader around 1940, and Jacintho Guérin in 1956 –, until Iphiclus was reinstated by Moacyr Alvarenga in the 1960s.