Beetles
awild | February 18, 2010
The inaugural blog carnival celebrating the Beetles is now online- go see!
awild | February 16, 2010I am impressed. Several of you* figured out the mystery behavior: reflex bleeding, a defensive response employed by some arthropods with especially nasty hemolymph to deter predators. A couple of you even pegged the identity of the mystery arthropod, a blister beetle in the genus Epicauta. Here's the uncropped photo:
An Epicauta blister beetle reflex bleeds when grasped with forceps.
Five points each to Tim, Ainsley, Neil, and Dave. And, ten points each to Pete and TGIQ.
So. Um. Don't spend them all in one place...
Posing on a mesquite flower.
*what's up with all the guessers-of-mysteries…
awild | February 15, 2010
We here at Myrmecos Blog don't care to voice our opinion of talk show host Glenn Beck. But we are rather enamored of dung beetles, those gorgeously ornamented insects who prevent the world from being buried in feces.
Thus, we were pleased to find the following Facebook project in our inbox this weekend:
Can This Dung Beetle Get More Fans Than Glenn Beck?
If you're on facebook, and you like dung beetles, now's your chance to become a fan.
h/t Jesse.
awild | February 5, 2010
A male western hercules beetle, Arizona.
Meet Dynastes granti. This behemouth of an insect is North America's heaviest scarab beetle, found in the mountains of the American southwest where adults feed on the sap of ash trees. I photographed these spectacular insects a few years ago while living in Tucson.
The impressive pronotal horn on the beetle pictured above indicates a male; females are considerably more modest in their armaments:
Male and female hercules beetles
As is so often the case in animals, males use their horns to fight each other for access to females, attempting to pry…
awild | December 4, 2009
Trox - Hide Beetle - Arizona, USA
Scarab's shrewd cousin,
Elytra warty like hide.
Must be Trogidae!
Photo details: Canon 100mm f2.8 macro lens on a Canon EOS 20D
ISO 100, f/16, 1/250 sec, indirect strobe in white box
awild | November 27, 2009
Notoxus desertus - Antlike Flower Beetle
Pyramid Lake, Nevada
This furry little beetle comes with its own sun visor, a horn-like structure that projects over the head from the pronotum. I photographed this Notoxus along the shores of Pyramid Lake where it was feeding on pollen.
Photo details: Canon MP-E 65mm 1-5x macro lens on a Canon EOS D60
ISO 100, f/13, 1/250 sec, diffused twin flash
awild | November 20, 2009Chauliognathus pennsylvanicus
Goldenrod Soldier Beetles
Illinois, USA
Here at Myrmecos Blog we aim for a family-friendly atmosphere. Except for beetle sex. Sometimes we just can't resist.
(There's also plant sex going on here too, if you're into that sort of thing...)
Photo details: Canon MP-E 65mm 1-5x macro lens on a Canon EOS 50D
ISO 100, f/13, 1/250 sec, diffused twin flash
awild | November 13, 2009
Edrotes ventricosus (Tenebrionidae) - Dune Beetle
California, USA
In arid environments around the world, darkling beetles in the family Tenebrionidae are among the most prominent insects. Their thick, waxy cuticles excel at retaining moisture. Edrotes ventricosus is a dune inhabitant in southern California.
Photo details: Canon MP-E 65mm 1-5x macro lens on a Canon EOS 20D
ISO 100, f/13, 1/250 sec, diffused twin flash
edyong | November 9, 2009The female case-bearing leaf beetle Neochlamisus platani tries to give her children a head-start in life, but most mothers might not be keen on how she does it - encasing her young in an armoured shell made of her own faeces. After she lays her eggs, she seals each one in a bell-shaped case. When the larva hatches, it performs some renovations, cutting a hole in the roof and enlarge the structure with their own poo. By sticking its head and legs out, it converts its excremental maisonette into a mobile home, one that it carries around with them until adulthood.
All leaf beetles do this, but…
awild | October 30, 2009
Tribolium castaneum, the Red Flour Beetle
Here's a beetle that the genetics-inclined entomologist will recognize. Tribolium castaneum, the red flour beetle, was the first Coleopteran to have its genome sequenced.
This small tenebrionid is native to the Indo-Australian region but has become a pest of stored grains around the world. I photographed these individuals from a lab culture at the University of Arizona where they were being used in studies on beetle development.
Photo details: Canon MP-E 65mm 1-5x macro lens on a Canon EOS 20D
ISO 100, f/13, 1/250 sec, diffused flash
awild | October 23, 2009
Female (left) and male Sandalus niger Cicada Parasite Beetles
Sandalus niger is one of the oddest beetles in eastern North America. While most parasitic insects are concentrated in other orders- notably Hymenoptera and Diptera- Coleoptera contains relatively few parasites. But there are a few.
Beetle larvae in the small polyphagan family Rhipiceridae attack cicada nymphs in their underground burrows. Our local species is Sandalus niger, and in the past week the spectacular inch-long adults have been gathering in mating aggregations on tree trunks around campus.
the remarkable…
awild | October 16, 2009
Scarites sp. Ground Beetle (Carabidae)
Urbana, Illinois
As the summer bug season freezes to a close here in Illinois, our attention turns increasingly to the cryptic habitats where insects settle in to overwinter. The flowers have faded, but insects can still be found under tree bark, in rotting wood, and in leaf litter. This ground beetle had burrowed under a stone, aided by its shovel-like fossorial forelegs.
Photo details: Canon MP-E 65mm 1-5x macro lens on a Canon EOS 50D
ISO 100, f/11, 1/200 sec, flash diffused through tracing paper
awild | October 9, 2009I admit to a soft spot for beetles in the family Nitidulidae. Maybe it's the cute clubby antennae. Or maybe it's just the shared fondness for beer. In any case, the sap beetles are charming little insects.
I found this Amphicrossus imbibing fermented tree sap from a wounded tree in downtown Champaign, Illinois. Tree wounds and their associated yeasts are fertile hunting grounds for entomologists as they host a surprising array of often unique flies and beetles.
Photo details: Canon MP-E 65mm 1-5x macro lens on a Canon EOS 50D
ISO 100, f/13, 1/250 sec, flash diffused through tracing…
awild | October 2, 2009
Chlaenius sp. ground beetle, Urbana, Illinois
This colorful beetle came from our back yard. It's a ground beetle in the genus Chlaenius, recognizeable from its pubescent elytra and pungent defensive secretions. Like most ground beetles, Chlaenius makes a living as a predator.
The beetle's metallic sheen is not the result of a pigment but of fine microscopic sculpturing on the integument. This is evident when the insect is viewed at a different aspect: notice how the color turns to green in lateral view:
The same beetle, in sideview.
photo details: Canon 100mm f2.8 macro lens on a…
awild | September 25, 2009
Nicrophorus orbicollis, Sexton Beetle, Illinois
The intrepid students of IB 468 caught this beautiful black burying beetle during a field trip to Dixon Springs, Illinois. They were kind enough to let me photograph it before it went to the collection.
Rather than me blathering on about this insect's biology, I'll direct you instead to the N. orbicollis wikipedia page. Wikipedia is normally hit-or-miss with regard to insects, but the page for N. orbicollis is an example of the medium at its best.
One thing about carrion beetles, though. Pretty, yes. But they smell terrible, and I…
awild | September 18, 2009
Odontotaenius disjunctus, the horned passalus
Friday Beetle Blogging returns this week with portraits of an unusually social beetle. The horned passalus Odontotaenius disjunctus lives in groups in rotting logs, where adults practice a form of parental care. I photographed this individual last weekend in southern Illinois, but the species ranges from the tropical forests of Central and South America Texas to as far north as New York.
photo details (all photos): Canon 100 mm f2.8 macro lens on a Canon EOS 50D
ISO 160, f/10-13, 1/125 sec, indirect strobe diffused in a white box
edyong | July 4, 2009Walks through a forest are often made all the more enjoyable by the chance to watch brightly coloured birds flit between the trees. But birds are not just mere inhabitants of forests - in some parts of the world, they are the key to the trees' survival.
The Serengeti is one such place. Since 1950, around 70-80% of riverside forests have disappeared from this area. Fires seem to be a particular problem, opening large gaps in the canopy that forests can't seem to recover from. To understand why Gregory Sharam from the University of British Columbia has been monitoring the density of the…
awild | June 26, 2009Alaus oculatus (Elateridae) - The Eyed Elater
Illinois
One of North America's largest beetles, the eyed elater is more than an inch long. Alaus oculatus is widespread in the deciduous forests of eastern North America where their larvae are predators of wood-boring beetles. Other species of Alaus occur in the south and west. This individual was attracted to a pheromone trap intended to bring in longhorn beetles as part of a University of Illinois study on beetle pheromones, a ready demonstration of how predators may exploit the chemical signaling of their prey.
This particular beetle has…
edyong | June 25, 2009You've got to feel sorry for the female seed beetle. Whenever she mates with a male, she has to contend with his spiked, nightmarish penis (remember this picture?). And despite the damage that it inflicts, one liaison just isn't enough; female seed beetles typically mate with many males before they lay their eggs. Surely, she must benefit in some way?
The most likely idea is that she somehow ensures that her eggs are fertilised by sperm from males with the "best" genes - those that either make for particularly fit and healthy young, or that are a compatible match for the female's own genes.…
jricco | June 25, 2009
The what???
Well, you see, one of the traditional events at the Lindau Nobel Laureates Meeting is the annual cockchafer speech. Let me explain that.
The first conference in 1951 ended with a gathering of all attending Nobel laureates and their host, Count Lennart Bernadotte, to take a group photograph. Unfortunately it turned out that the laureates felt quite uncomfortable in front of the camera - and a group photograph of annoyed men would not have given the right impression of the successful first meeting.
So, when Count Bernadotte saw a cockchafer lying on the ground, he picked it up and…