Tabanus gratus Löw, 1858

19. Tabanus gratus Löw, 1858 View in CoL

( Figs 2 View Figures 1–4 , 6 View Figures 5–8 , 10 View Figures 9–12 )

Öfversigt af Kongliga Vetenskapsakademiens Förhandlingar, 14, 340.

Type locality. South Africa .

Range. Afrotropical and Palearctic, widespread in Africa, penetrating the Palearctic realm through the East Mediterranean from Egypt, through Western Saudi Arabia and the Levant to Iran and Afghanistan ( Oldroyd, 1954; Leclercq, 1966a; Müller et al., 2012b, Evenhuis & Pape, 2023). Recently recorded in Israel. Two females were collected in a Malaise trap near Ashdod on 15 June 2008; one male near Afula in an automatic light trap in mid-July 2012, and four females from horses near Nazareth in mid-June 2022 (Schlein, Kravchenko, Revay & Müller, unpublished data, new record for Israel). We collected two females while feeding on horses at the outskirts of Limassol in Cyprus in July 2009, a single male in an automatic light trap 12 km east of Paphos in 2012, and two females in a Malaise trap near Stavrovouni Monastery in an old olive grove with grazing donkeys in early July 2017 ( new record for Cyprus).