It’s my birthday, and as I’ve done almost every year of my adult life I did my first “real” collecting trip of the season. Since we’re down in Florida visiting Madam’s sister, I was especially excited for the chance to see new ground and hopefully find a few Florida specialties. The day started by getting up early to watch a spectacular full-moonset over the ocean—something I’ve never seen before.

I then headed up to the Citrus Wildlife Management Area of Withlacoochee State Forest to hook up with fellow beetle enthusiast (and soon-to-be book chapter coauthor) Kyle Schnepp from the Florida State Collection of Arthropods. Although Kyle and I have previously met at society meetings, it was our first time in the field together, and I was keen to take advantage of his local expertise to help me in my quest for Florida-endemic species. The habitat was dry oak/pine sandhill woodland with a grassy understory dotted with Opuntia australis (Florida pricklypear cactus)—itself an endemic plant.

Temperatures were comfortably cool starting out due to an overnight cold front (who knew there was such a thing in Florida?), and I was filled with anticipation as I arrived at the meeting point and prepared my gear and greeted Kyle and his two companions shortly afterwards. I’d hoped to encounter Brachys leafminers, and we beat the oaks, both Quercus laevis (turkey oak) and Q. geminata (sand oak), exhaustively in search of such, but none were found. At one point, I pulled out the telescoping tropics net to see if I would have better luck accessing the upper canopy, but I had no better luck. Through it all, however, I did get a few other miscellaneous beetles and treehoppers on the former and the same on the latter along with an Anthaxia sp. Kyle also collected a Mastogenius sp. on the latter, which I hoped to encounter as well but never did, while his companions encountered single specimens of Agrilus rubroniger (a very nice find—I have but a single specimen that I collected in southwestern Missouri) and Chrysobothris chrysoela. I continued to beat the oaks but increasingly turned my attention to other things, including the pricklypears. The flowers were closed at first (due either to the morning hour or cool temperatures), but peeling back the petals I encountered a mating pair of Trichiotinus rufobrunneus (Florida flower scarab)—a Florida specialty!—plus one of the smaller, more widespread Trichiotinus lunulatus.

I pulled the petals back on a few other flowers but didn’t see anything, then encountered a fallen dead branch of Pinus clausa (sand pine). Carefully lifting and turning over the branch revealed a Chrysobothris cribraria on the branch underside—just the second buprestid of the day for me. I then ran into Kyle again, who mentioned he’d seen a Mecas sp. on a grass stem, so I began sweeping the more open areas where the grasses—still mostly last season’s dried growth—and found two in my very first pass. These proved to be the largely endemic Mecas femoralis! I would continue to sweep grasses as I traversed the open areas of the woodland, eventually collecting a nice series of 12–15 specimens. As I was sweeping, I noticed isolated plants of the endemic Lupinis ocalensis (Ocala lupine) and, on the foliage of one, a mating pair of lixine weevils that proved to be the endemic Scaphomorphus subcylindricus.

I continued to the south side of the road where I’d earlier seen the pricklypears in hopes of finding the flowers now open. Such was the case, and in addition to further specimens of T. rufobrunneus I also encountered Acmaeodera ornata and Strangalia strigosa—the latter yet another Florida specialty that I’d not previously encountered.

Additional sweeping not only increased my series of M. femoralis but also turned up a mating pair of Typocerus zebra (zebra flower longhorn), while Kyle encountered a single Lycochoriolaus lateralis—apparently a mimic of lycid beetles, distasteful to predators, and yet another species I’d never encountered before. After nearly five hours, I decided to call it a day and started working my way back to the car. Along the way, I encountered a patch of Serenoa repens (saw palmetto) in flower. There was quite a bit of insect activity buzzing around the inflorescences, and a closer look revealed a variety of bees and a few Zelus longipes (milkweed assassin bugs) but few beetles of then oedemerids (false blister beetles). Then I noticed something “lycid-like” approaching the inflorescence, but something about it gave me pause. When it landed, I realized it was another L. lateralis. I was able to pick it up easily (it was not skittish as are most other longhorned beetles, perhaps because it relies on its mimicry to avoid predation), and further searching resulted in a fine series of nearly a dozen individuals, along with one more S. strigosa. Those would be the last insects collected, as beating oaks along the way back to the car still turned up nothing. I suppose I’ll need to make another trip down here if I want to collect Florida Brachys!

On the way back south (though not exactly “on the way home”), I stopped off at the Richloam Wildlife Management Area of Withlacoochee State Forest. Unlike the dry sandhill forest I’d just visited in the Citrus unit, the habitat here is wet sand forest. I was hoping to find stands of sedges (family Cyperaceae—usually found in and along wetlands) that I could sweep in the hopes of finding species of Taphrocerus—a genus of Buprestidae whose North American fauna I’ve been slowly revising over the years. These so-called “sedgy-wedgies” mine the leaves of various species of sedges, and there are still a few species of the genus that I haven’t yet myself collected—including the endemic T. floridanus. Kyle had recommended a location where I might find such sedges, which were abundant along the roadside. I swept them thoroughly, but to no avail.

As I was sweeping, a truck stopped and the driver called out to me and said “I just wanted to let you know I’ve already seen four or five good-sized rattlers here!” I thanked the man for his warning—though in reality I very well may have seen more rattlers in my lifetime than him. The man lingered as I returned to what I was doing—seemingly disappointed or surprised that his warning didn’t result in my immediate withdrawal. I suppose he was expecting me to run back to the car screaming like a little girl who’d just seen a spider. I was actually really hoping to see a rattler afterwards and was disappointed that I did not. The forest at this point was impenetrable, so I walked about a quarter-mile down the roadside, checking the flowers of Rosa palustris (swamp rose) along the way and being surprised to not see a single beetle—or any other insect, for that matter—upon them. In fact, the only insects I saw on anything were two very large “caterpillars”—actually larvae of Cimbex americanus (elm sawfly), a primitive wasp—on Salix caroliniana (Carolina willow).

I crossed the road to walk the other side and soon ran into an Ilex cassine (dahoon holly) tree in full flower that was leaning over the roadside.

I saw a mating pair of Lyconotus lateralis (family Lycidae) on the flowers—their presence alerting me to the possibility of finding their longhorned beetle mimic, Elytroleptus floridanus. Despite finding perhaps a dozen lycid beetles, I found no E. floridanus. Another holly tree further up the road also hosted lycids but no longhorned beetles.

Continuing a quarter-mile the other way past the car and further sweeping of sedges along the way back to the car was fruitless, and the lateness of the hour told me my insect collecting activities for the day had finally come to an end. Neverthess, I was content with series of several nice beetle species in my bottles, including a few true Florida specialities, and made my way back home.

©️ Ted C. MacRae 2024