Biogeographia – The Journal of Integrative Biogeography

We present a dataset reporting the checklist of the species of the family Simuliidae (Diptera, Nematocera) for Italy, updating the one previously published in the series ‘Checklist delle Specie della Fauna d'Italia’ in 1995. The records of the updated checklist refer to the 70 species currently known from areas politically falling within the borders of Italy (belonging to 6 genera: 55 to Simulium genus, 8 to Prosimulium, 3 to Metacnephia, 2 to Urosimulium, 1 to Greniera, 1 to Twinnia) at the regional level (20 terrestrial units). The records refer to various freshwater lotic habitats, from glacier melting waters to large plain rivers. The previous checklist reported a total number of 71 species, of which one represented in Italy with 2 subspecies, belonging to 5 genera: 58 to Simulium genus, 9 to Prosimulium, 3 to Metacnephia, 1 to Greniera, 1 to Twinnia; Urosimulium genus was separated from Prosimulium, 8 species changed subgenus (since the former was disregarded), 1 new species was added, 2 species names were changed while 3 species and 1 subspecies were put in synonymy with other species. Scanning 18 papers we found published between 1997 and 2020, we could expand the regional records. The dataset is freely available from Lifewatch at https://www.lifewatchitaly.eu/en/initiatives/checklist-fauna-italia-en/checklist. The dataset will be dynamically updated with new records; this paper describes the state of the art of the dataset on December 2021.