Magdalis carbonaria

This species is associated with birch and this individual was found in an ancient wood with plenty of birch (although it was potted off a Hazel leaf). Apparently there were only 5 records in Norfolk up to 2021 so not a common species.

I guess this subfamily and genus is quite distinctive once learnt, but of course without knowing what to look for when you first encounter one they look superficially similar to quite a few black weevils. I had trouble keying it to subfamily using Duff so turned to Hackston which got it to Mesoptiliinae (and therefore to genus Magdalis as it's the only genus in the subfamily) fairly straightforwardly. The problem with Duff here was that I judged the interocular distance as being clearly narrower than the narrowest width of the rostrum rather than about as wide or only slightly narrower (it was, after all, about 3/4 of the width, so I don't think that was unreasonable).

I used Duff initially to key it to species and then, as this seems to be quite a scarce species, checked this using Hackston. Hackston provided some additional characters to check (including fore tibia shape) and both keys clearly led to carbonaria.

Magdalis carbonaria showing rostrum and interocular space, scutellum, forecorner of pronotum, front femur, pronorum, overall length, front tibia and elytron, Wendling Beck Environment Project (Norfolk, UK), 17th May 2024