Introduction

Scale insects constitute a group of plant-feeding hemipterans that comprises over 8500 species. In Poland 143 species of Coccomorpha have been registered excluding greenhouse species. Investigations on scale insect fauna in urban environments in Poland have been conducted for over 80 years.

Methods

Our studies were carried out between 2005 and 2024 in selected cities and towns in Upper Silesia, which is the most industrialized region in Poland. Adult females were collected by carefully combing through the host plants and the surface layers of the soil by hand. Specimens were preserved in 70% ethanol and identified on the basis of permanent microscope slides. The specimens were found in urban parks, forests, xerothermic and psammophilous grasslands and post-industrial wastelands.

Results

We found 64 species that belonged to 10 families. The Pseudococcidae was the largest family comprising 23 species. Among the collected species 30 were found on woody plants, 33 on herbaceous plants and only 1 in the surface layer of the soil. Some species formed large colonies on their host plants e.g. Pulvinaria kuwacola Kuwana, 1907, which is invasive species collected in urban parks in different sites. Each year new localities of this species were found in the area of Upper Silesia. Parthenolecanium corni (Bouché, 1844) and Lepidosaphes ulmi (Linnaeus, 1758) were among the most common species. There were species considered to be rare in Poland that were collected in urban areas e.g. Porphyrophora polonica (Linnaeus, 1758) and Puto superbus (Leonardi, 1907).

Conclusions

The assemblages of scale insects in urban environments showed lower species diversity and a larger percentage of polyphagous species than in non-urban areas. The increase in the range of invasive species in the cities and towns is caused by many factors, of which global warming seems to be one of the most important.