This isn't bee, but rather a robber fly in the genus Mallophora. Most of the members of this genus strongly mimic bumblebess, which are their primary prey. This is the first time I've seen one, and I was very excited! In Kansas, there is only one species: Mallophora orcina the Southern Bee Killer. This is actually a mating pair, but the mate is mostly hidden.
Taking a break from Coleoptera for a while to show off some of the Robber Flies that I found up at Lake Tahoe National Forest. This individual is Machimus occidentalis and was kindly identified by Eric Fisher. Not sure what the prey it has is. This species is pretty large, and quite photogenic. I'll show one or two others as I get them posted. I have a rather uncommon one up next!
Most people have seen stag beetle, in the family Lucanidae, even if they didn't know the name. The large beetles with enormous mandibles are members of this family, and they're pretty popular in photos and movies of 'scary' insects.
The Lucanids are the first three families I'll be covering in the Superfamily Scarabaeoidea. This group includes Scarab Beetles, Bess Beetles, and several other less common families. While not a particularly speciose family, Lucanids make up for it by being very impressive to look at. While the most obvious feature are the large, non-functional mandibles, these are only found in males, and some, such as this Sindodendron rugosum don't have them at all (though this species is pretty odd looking for a Lucanid). A better characteristic if you get close is that the antennal club can't be compressed down so that it looks like it's one piece.
Lucanids are found on dead logs, where they lay their eggs. Many are rather host specific, and can only be found in certain types of forest. The adults can be seen guarding their log, though with this species they're pretty inconspicuous. This species can be found in mixed redwood and oak forests.
Another species that is more typical was featured in my insect anatomy segment. Platycerus oregonensis is another Lucanid that lives in the same habitat as Sinodendron. The species shown in that link is a large male, with a more typical type of jaw. However, if you really want to see an impressive Lucanid, search for Lucanus elaphus this species can be up to 5cm long including the jaws and is found in the southeast forests.
Congratulations, we've made it to the largest (though not last) family of organisms in the world - the Weevils. The family Curculionidae is comprised of some 60,000+ species, making it the most speciose group of organisms on the planet, plant or animal. The two families that come close are the Rove Beetles in the family Staphylinidae, and a group of wasps called the Ichneumonidae (though this group has the potential to surpass the other two).
They are members of the superfamily Curculionoidea, which is composed of several weevil-like families. The most noticeable characteristic of this large group is the rostrate head, aka the snout. The other characteristic is that the antennae are 'elbowed' the technical term is geniculate.
Weevils can be found virtually anywhere a fact that makes them among the worst pests in agriculture all over the world. Included amongst these pests are the well known boll-weevil of the cotton industry and the insect featured above, Otiorhynchus sulcatus.
The taxonomy of weevils is usually in a state of flux but I'll give the placement of this species as it stands now.
Superfamily Curculionoidea<Family Curculionidae<Subfamily Entiminae<Otiorhynchus sulcatus
Robber Flies are now one of my favorite subjects to photograph and in the last week or two I've been lucky enough to get some great shots of them. Eric Fisher kindly identified these two photos. The one on the top is a mating pair of Lestomyia Robbers, and can't be identified further without a specimen. They were taken on the trail up to Sentinel Dome in Yosemite National Park
The one below is a female Stenopogon cazieri and was kind enough to perch still long enough to get some excellent photos. It was taken on Mount Diablo State Park.
Taxonomy:
Superfamily Asiloidea<Family Asilidae<Subfamily Dasypogoninae<Lestomyia sp
Superfamily Asiloidea>Family Asilidae<Subfamily Stenopogoninae<Stenopogon cazieri
Everybody likes ladybugs, which is somewhat of a misnomer as they are in fact beetles, and are in the family Coccinellidae. Almost everyone has seen these insects and the red-with-black-dots pattern is familiar to all. What almost nobody knows save entomologists is that what you've seen and what most people know to be a ladybeetle is actually the vast minority in terms of species. There are thousands of species of these beetles and most of them are only a few millimeters in size and most aren't even red, like those in the genus Scymnus.
The species I'm doing today, Hippodamia convergens are one of those exceptions to the rule. The Convergent Ladybeetle gets it's name from their habit of congregating en masse in the thousands and thousands, as in the photo above. You can also see in this picture an important point about ladybeetles; they're very variable in appearance (phenotypic variance). I've found that for the larger species, the pattern on the head and pronotum is much more stable and better for identification purposes. A case in point is the subspecies of Coccinella trifasciata called C. trifasciata subversa. The nominate subspecies has three black bands across the elytra, but the subversa subspecies only has one,
but the pattern on the pronotum and head give it away.
Taxonomically, Coccinellids are in a new superfamily, Cucujoidea, the bark beetles and allies. This is a pretty large group that has a lot of very small and hard to ID species in a lot of different families.
Taxonomy:
Superfamily Cucujoidea<Family Coccinellidae<Hippodamia convergens
This is the only representative of the Superfamily Cleroidea that I have. It's a Soft-winged Flower Beetle in the family Melyridae.
I know very little about this surprisingly abundant family save that they are usually very small and are almost always hard to identify. At the collection at PPDC in Sacramento, there are about two drawers of identified Melyrids and 8 unidentified drawers.
I do know that they're pollen and nectar feeders and can often be found on flower heads, thought they're small enough that they can be easily overlooked. This Amecocerus was less than 5mm long.
Taxonomy:
Superfamily Cleroidea<Family Melyridae<Genus Amecocerus
The second of the two major families in the superfamily Chrysomeloidea is the eponymous Chrysomelidae, the leaf beetles. This individual is Labidomera clavivollis - Swamp Milkweed Beetle. It's taxonomy is as follows
Coleoptera<Superfamily Chrysomeloidea<Family Chrysomelidae<Subfamily Chrysomelinae<Labidomera clavicollis
The leaf beetles are, in terms of patterning, one of the most diverse groups of beetles out there. They range from drab, brown and skinny to brightly colored and circular to metallic greens and blues and everything in between. It's a large family and has many different subfamilies, most of which are fairly disparate in their appearance. It's very hard though to give a hard and fast rule to separate them out without getting more techincal than this description warrants. In general though, if it's smallish, brightly colored or heavily patterned there's a pretty good chance that it's a Chrysomelid. Hopefully by the end of this series on families you'll be able to differentiate between the exceptions to this rule.
As can be guessed by their name, Chrysomelids feed on vegetation of various kinds, and often have a host plant that they are commonly found on. The leaf above that the Swamp Milkweed Beetle is on is in fact from Swamp Milkweed. This can greatly expedite identifications if you know the plant you found it on, especially for a species with great phenotypic (appearance) variation like this one.
In short, they're small, cute and colorful, but a ID'ing 'em is a pain in the
The next superfamily in line is the Chrysomeloidea - the Leaf and Long-horned beetles and allies. Taxonomically they're at the end of the beetles, closer to the Curculionoidea, but for the purposes of this I'm continuing in alphabetical order.
The first of the two major families from this group that I'm doing is the Cerambycidae, Long-horned Beetles. The individual here is a member of the subfamily Cerambycinae. The taxonomy of this group is as follows:
Order Coleoptera<Superfamily Chrysomeloidea<Family Cerambycidae<Subfamily Cerambycinae< Cryptophorus verrucosus
This is a pretty large family, containing many thousands of species. Almost all of them can be characterized by an elongated body shape and very long antennae, though there are always some exceptions to the rule. There are several Long-horns without the long-horns, but they are the vast minority. Another good, though kind of technical feature is the nature of the tarsi. The penultimate tarsomere is concealed by the lobed third tarsomere (like I said techincal). Basically it has five tarsomeres but only looks like it has four. In terms of size, they range from 5mm~ (probably smaller ones too, but I've not seen them) up to 6cm plus, and that's just in the US. In fact, the largest beetles in North America, at least in length belong to the subfamily Prioninae, which are characterized by being very large and robust. The antennae are also usually thicker and not quite as long as many of the other subfamilies.
They're not my speciality, so I can't tell you much about ther ecology, except that they like to come to lights and many can be seen on flowers, like the one above. Many of them are root and tree borers, and the larvae can be found inside dead and living trees (mostly dead). Because of this, many are considered to be pests.
While this is hardly the most attractive photo I've put up, it's the only representative of the Superfamily Byrroidea, the Pill, water and toe-winged Beetles. This is a member of the Tow-winged Beetle family Ptilodactylidae. Not a whole lot to say about either grouping other than that they tend towards very very small. This family is pretty small, at least in the US. The pectinate antennae (they're branched) and the setose (hairy) elytra are pretty good indicators of this family, and especially the genus Ptilodactyla like this individual. They're often collected at lights near water, as this one was in Florida.
Taxonomy:
Order Coleoptera<Suborder Polyphaga<Superfamily Byrroidea<Family Ptilodactylidae< Ptilodactyla sp.
