Calosoma (Orinodromus) leleupi Basilewsky, 1962
Orinodromus Leleupi Basilewsky, 1962: 66 (type locality: Ngorongoro), holotype ♂ and paratypes in Musée Royal de l'Afrique Centrale, Tervuren [examined]
Basilewsky (1962:65) described as a good species: C. leleupi, from mount Ngoro Ngoro, 200 km west of Kilimanjaro, quite far from the crater of mount Hanang, and from mount Ufiomi, where C. neumanni, another very similar species, lives.
The two species are quite similar to each other in the external facies, and therefore with regard to the systematic position within the subgenus Orinodromus, the same considerations made with respect to C. neumanni are applicable.
The peculiarities that distinguish C. leleupi consist in the shape of its pronotum which is rounded, not narrowed behind, with non-protruding lobes, and, primarily, in the character of the penis ligula with the apex twisted on one side, asymmetrical.
Note that the two species occupy two mountain ranges west of Kilimanjaro, widely separated from each other by large tracts of arid savannah. It is possible that also in this case the fragmentation of the populations may be related to the Pleistocene cycles of cooling and drying of the African climate (Fattorini, 2007). These climatic cycles represented an important occasion for the widespread of flightless species and for their subsequent confinement and separate evolution on neighboring mountain systems.
The distribution area of C. leleupi could, however, be wider since Basilewsky (1962: 67) dubiously cites an ancient female specimen from the Museum für Naturkunde in Berlin indicated as coming from the mountains near Engaruka about thirty kilometers north-east of Ngoro Ngoro crater.
Material examined:
Tanzania, Ngorongoro, praire subalpine, 1500-2500m, (RMCA, holotype & paratypes) (MNHN, NMB, paratypes)
Notes: Rear wings reduced to stumps.. The capture of the specimens of the typical series was carried out in an alpine meadow at 2600 m altitude in the month of May and that of the only specimen from the mountains near Engaruka in the month of October.
The species is named after Narcisse Leleup (1912 – 2001) an entomologist who collected in Congo and in other African countries for the Tervuren Museum in the years 1940s & 1950s.
 Ngorongoro, praire subalpine, 1500-2500m, 17-18.VI.1957, miss. Zool. IRSAC en Afrique Orientale (P.Basilewsky et N. Leleup) (holotype) (coll. Musée Royal de l'Afrique Central, Tervuren) |
 Basilewsky, 1962 Ngoro Ngoro 2600m, 17-18.VI.57, Leleup (coll. Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle, Paris) |