**2. Materials and methods**

#### **2.1 Object of investigation**

*C. exaratus* is large (22–28 mm) beetle with elongated body and long legs. It is distributed from foothill steppes till subnival zone. Dominates at foothills in North-Eastern Caucasus and plain parts of Ciscaucasia [5]. Recorded in Rostov and Krasnodar Provinces. Generalist, forest-meadow species, predator with springsummer breeding.

#### **2.2 Sampling area**

We trapped beetles in two biotopes at Krasnodar Province, Tuapse district, Russia. The first biotope was forb-cereal meadow (44.3833°N 38.9667°E, 550 m asl), periodically used for *Zea mays* L. and *Solanum tuberosum* L. cultivation and grazing. The second one was beech-hornbeam forest in Maliy Pshish rever valley (44.1561°N 39.5279°E 520 m asl). Beetles were sampled in 2018 and transported to Laboratory of Biomonitoring Institute for Problems of Ecology and Mineral Wealth Use of Tatarstan Academy of Sciences for measuring. Presented work is the fragment of the investigations in our laboratory. Beginning from 1996, we sampled ground beetles in different regions of Russia and abroad. Beetles are sampled by professional carabidologists for their own purposes and then are posted to our laboratory for the morphometric analysis, because the main aim of our investigation is the clarifying ecogeographical rules (Bergmann, Rensch ets.). So we have to process material in male and female body size variation in latitude and longitude gradients. Thus, samples from the region mentioned (Krasnodar Province) were the part of the material we need to fulfill our aims.

#### **2.3 Morphometric analysis**

Nikon D5100 camera was used to get images of beetles. We acted according to the methodology approved in our laboratory, since morphometric analysis requires certain skills and must be carried out by permanent employees. We measured them using a program. The latter was written specifically for the given method of measurement and utilized a distance between manually pointed out elements of photo arrays as the terminal point of measurements and the fiducial scale. Initial codes from the program are available under the free permissive license MIT [6]. Six traits were under investigation: the length and the width of elytra, pronotum, and head. In total, 480 specimens were measured.

#### **2.4 Statistical analysis**

Statistical analysis was done using Excel programs. Sexual Size Dimorphism (hereinafter SSD) was calculated as follows: mean value of trait in females/mean value of trait in males-1 [7].

*Sexual Dimorphism in Physiological Reactions to Biotope Type (the Case Study in Ground Beetles) DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.113819*
