Carabus(Procerus) gigas

Yes, my 2 females are record sizes for P. scabrosus bureschianus and thus very rare and impressive. Actually, they are the biggest Procerus I've ever seen/catched, however, for P. gigas, as maximum size is given 60mm (but the biggest specimen of parnassicus I've found is around 54mm). The 58+ female bureschianus will become 59+ if I relax it and open the mandibles..! I measured all 3 females recently very carefully and the smaller is 54mm (55 if mandibles open), and the other 2 are +58 and +57mm (the 57 one has opened mandibles, so this is its full size), - I had measured them before wrongly and thought they were of smaller length. It was one of my most unforgetable collecting times with beetles when I found it (the 58mm, but also the 57mm one as it's a bit shorter but wider ! ) : she was crossing a small forest road quickly, that if I hadn't run to catch it (I spotted it from a distance of 50 meters or more), I would have probably lost it in the grasses !
Not Mts. Lekanis at Kavala, but near Xanthi (Stavroupoli), and Drama. It occurs also on Mts. Lekanis (Xanthi is very close to Kavala, and Drama close to Kavala), but I haven't searched for it there personally. It is rare and hard to find (I've found single specimens, very rarely 2 in one day), - except if you know people who breed the giant forest snails (which bureschianus eat) close to their habitats..( I haven't tried pitfall traps with Procerus, as they all are too far from my home to go twice and check them, -probably they are more useful with duponcheli, as for example on Taygetos is known a quite big population at a not so big area, -possibly the same happens with gigas parnassicus at certain Fagus forests of N. Greece and at the right time..).


Thanos