A cicindelophilic wish list

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  • Cicindelia obsoleta vulturina disjuncts bolting across lichen-covered sandstone balds.
  • Cicindela scutellaris yampae—red, white and blue in all its glory!
  • Big, bold, hugely white Cicindela formosa gibsoni bouncing across the sand.
  • Cicindela arenicola dancing across the St. Anthony dunes.
  • Hugely-mandibled male Cicindela waynei riding the backs of their lovers.
  • The almost pure white Cicindela albissima in its own tiny little corner of Utah.
  • Cicindela theatina, perhaps most colorful of the western sand dune species.

In a perfect world, I will make it to every one of these locations and encounter each and every species in the list. More realistically, it would be presumptuous to expect complete success on such a quickly planned, last minute trip—I’ll be happy to make it to at least some of these sites and find what I’m looking for. Beyond the above species there should also be the more reliable Cicindela lengi, C. tranquebarica, and the nominate forms of C. formosa and C. scutellaris—classic denizons of the west. When I get a chance to take a look in alkaline flats, perhaps I’ll also be able to add C. willistoni or C. parowana to the bounty list. When I can take specimens, I will (responsibly), and when I can’t I’ll hopefully take acceptable photos. Really though, this is mostly about getting out and seeing a huge swath of the country that I’ve never seen before during the most gorgeous time of year. I’ll see it my way—up close and personal and not just blasting by at 70 mph. Sometimes life just doesn’t get any better!

Copyright © Ted C. MacRae 2011

Not all Florida tiger beetles are rare

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Tetracha carolina (Carolina Metallic Tiger Beetle) | Dixie Co., Florida

I fear my recent series of posts from Florida might leave readers with the impression that all of that state’s tiger beetle species are rare endemics occurring in tiny remnants of relictual habitats and encountered only by the most intrepid collectors enduring the harshest of conditions.  While it’s true that Florida has its share of such species (perhaps more than any other state in the country), it is also home to numerous species that most cicindelophiles would consider rather common—even pedestrian.  “Common” is a relative term, however, depending on where you live, and featured here is a species that until recently would have been for me just as exciting a find as Cicindelidia scabra or Habroscelimorpha striga.

Purple reflections and expanded apical lunules on the elytra distinguish this species from T. floridana

Tetracha carolina (Carolina Metallic Tiger Beetle) is one of the most widely distributed tiger beetle species in the Western Hemisphere, occurring not only across the southern U.S. but also the West Indies and south through Mexico, Central America, and the west coast of South America to Chile.  It was only during the past 10 years, however, that I actually saw the species for myself in Missouri, as it is restricted to the Mississippi Alluvial Plain in the extreme southeastern corner of the state (the so-called “Bootheel”).  Not much was known about the status of this species in Missouri the first time I encountered it under building lights at the University of Missouri Delta Research Center in Portageville.  It was my first experience with “nocturnal tiger beetling,” and you can imagine my excitement at seeing these green and purple beauties glittering in the light of my headlamp.  We now know that the species, despite its restricted occurrence in Missouri, is actually quite common in a variety of habitats in that part of the state, including even agricultural fields where they hide during the day under irrigation pipes (Fothergill et al. 2011).

I simply can't resist these tiger beetle face shots!

The individual in the photographs shown here was seen at the famed “Road to Nowhere” site in a remote part of the Florida Gulf Coast—one of eight total species of tiger beetles that I’ve seen at this site during my two August visits (2009 and this year).  This site is actually one of a few places in Florida where this species co-occurs with T. floridana (Florida Metallic Tiger Beetle), an endemic species restricted to estuarian habitats in the southern half of the Florida peninsula, and until recently considered a subspecies of T. carolina (Naviaux 2007).  The brilliant purple reflections in the basal half of the elytra clearly distinguish this individual as T. carolina, as did its occurrence up on the drier sandy roadside rather than down in the salty mud flats preferred by T. floridana.  Also seen at this site up along the road were numerous adults of the broadly distributed T. virginica (Virginia Metallic Tiger Beetle), making this one of the few sites in the country where three of the four U.S. species of Tetracha can be found (the fourth, T. impressa—Upland Metallic Tiger Beetle, is a Neotropical species that reaches the U.S. only in the Lower Rio Grande Valley of south Texas).

REFERENCE:

Fothergill, K., C. B. Cross, K. V. Tindall, T. C. MacRae and C. R. Brown. 2011. Tetracha carolina L. (Coleoptera: Carabidae: Cicindelitae) associated with polypipe irrigation systems in southeastern Missouri agricultural lands. Cicindela 43(3): in press.

Naviaux R. 2007. Tetracha (Coleoptera, Cicindelidae, Megacephalina): Revision du genre et descriptions de nouveaus taxons. Mémoires de la Société entomologique de France 7:1–197.

Copyright © Ted C. MacRae 2011

Two things I love about glades during fall…

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…prairie dock (Silphium terebinthinaceum) in bloom…

Prairie dock (Silphium terebinthinaceum) in bloom | Caney Mountain Cons. Area, Ozark Co., Missouri

…and prairie tiger beetles (Cicindelidia obsoleta vulturina) on the prowl…

Prairie tiger beetle (Cicindelidia obsoleta vulturina) | Caney Mountain Cons. Area, Ozark Co., Missouri

On the last weekend of August I made another trip to the White River Hills of north-central Arkansas in a last gasp effort to confirm the occurrence in the area of the swift tiger beetle (Cylindera celeripes).  Records of this species include a single individual collected in 1996 at a site near Calico Rock, but two trips to the area this past June had already failed to reveal its presence.  I didn’t really expect that I would find it this time either, and such was the case.  However, what I was expecting/hoping to see was the beginning of the fall emergence of the prairie tiger beetle.  The Missouri/Arkansas disjunct population of this handsome species is perhaps my favorite tiger beetle of all, not only because of its good looks but because of the many spectacular fall collecting trips I’ve taken through the White River Hills to look for it.  In this regard I had success, although only two individuals were seen all day long.  The area around Calico Rock seemed dry, apparently having been missed by the thunderstorms that rolled through the area a week earlier and that would have surely triggered full bore adult emergence. 

Long Bald Glade Natural Area, Caney Mountain Cons. Area, Ozark Co., Missouri

The following day I returned to Caney Mountain Conservation Area on the Missouri side, where last fall I had finally found prairie tiger beetles after years of searching what must be the extreme northeasternmost limit of its distribution.  Fresh evidence of recent rains was seen, and accordingly the beetles were out in fairly decent numbers in the same area where I found them last fall.  I took the opportunity to photograph a few individuals (which I had not done last year) and then turned my attention to looking for other insects.  I had my eye out for the spectacularly beautiful bumelia borer (Plinthocoelium suaveolens) and eventually found one.  I hoped also to see the marvelously monstrous Microstylum morosum (North America’s largest robber fly), which I found at this site in 2009 as a new state record and was rewarded with two individuals (these will serve as vouchers for the state record, since I didn’t collect it in 2009).  Temperatures were rather warm and both of these latter species are traditional “summer” species; however, the presence of prairie tiger beetles, the tawny tinge to the prairie grasses, and the noticeably longer shadows under a deep blue sky told me that fall was, indeed, on the way.

Prairie tiger beetle (Cicindelidia obsoleta vulturina) | Caney Mountain Cons. Area, Ozark Co., Missouri

While prairie tiger beetles are (at least for me) the most iconic harbinger of fall in the White River Hills, another classic fall sight was the thick stands of prairie dock plants with their tall, bolting flower spikes.  In Missouri this plant serves as a larval host for the longhorned beetle Ataxia hubbardi.  In my early years of collecting in Missouri’s glades, I delighted in finding adults of these beetles clinging to the flower stalks during fall—presumably laying eggs from which larvae would hatch and bore down into the tap-root.  Although commonly regarded as a pest in sunflower in the southern Great Plains, individuals associated with prairie dock in Missouri’s glades seem different—smaller, narrower, and darker—than those found on sunflower and other more common hosts.  Additional material will be needed to make a final assessment on whether these individuals represent a distinct taxon; however, I have not been able to find this species on prairie dock in Missouri since I moved back to the state nearly 16 years ago.  The reason for this sudden disappearance remains a mystery, and perhaps it is purely coincidental that the Missouri Department of Conservation began managing all of their glades with prescribed burns during my previous 5-year absence from the state.  In the meantime, I will continue to examine prairie dock stems every fall in the hopes that once again I will find the beetles and be able to come to a decision about their taxonomic status.  Perhaps I should re-focus my efforts in “low quality” (i.e., never-burned) gladey roadsides rather than our state’s “high quality” (i.e., high floral diversity) natural areas.

Copyright © Ted C. MacRae 2011

Crazy Eyes

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Spissistilus festinus | Stoneville, Mississippi

Spissistilus festinus (three-cornered alfalfa hopper) is one of the few truly economic pests in the otherwise bizarre and innocuous family Membracidae (treehoppers).  Its common name alludes to one of the crops it affects, but my encounters with this species are most often in soybean (I am, after all, a soybean entomologist).  Damage in this crop is caused by both adults and nymphs, whose piercing/sucking mouthparts cause girdling and breakage of the stem—often just a few inches above the soil.  This individual was seen during my travels last week in a soybean field in Stoneville, Mississippi, where numbers throughout the season were especially high this year.  Although I have seen innumerable S. festinus adults, I have never noticed their crazy, zig-zag patterned red and white eyes until I managed this closeup face shot (click on photo for best view).

This slightly cropped photo was taken with a 100mm macro lens and full extension tube set, resulting in slightly more than 2X magnification.  One of the lessons I took from was the need to pay more attention to background and value contrast.  By placing the subject a few inches in front of the dark green soybean foliage I was able to achieve a much more pleasing background than the typical black background one gets with full flash photos at high magnification.  Although both the subject and the background are green, there is still sufficient difference in shade to create contrast between them.  Light-green is one of the more difficult colors to work with when full flash is used with high shutter speeds and small apertures to maximize crispness and detail (in this case, 1/250 sec and f/16).  However, increasing ISO to 400 and lowering flash exposure compensation to -2/3 can reduce the amount of flash needed to illuminate the subject with such settings, making it easier to achieve a properly exposed and true-colored subject.

Copyright © Ted C. MacRae 2011

Mini-review of the Cicindelidia abdominalis species-group

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Now that I have seen and photographed in the field all four species of the Cicindelidia abdominalis species-group, I thought some might find it useful to have a summary of each species with comparisons, photographs and a key to distinguish the four species. The key presented below is based on that found in Brzoska et al. (2011), which itself is a modification of couplet 8 in the key to the species of Common Tiger Beetles (Cicindela) found in Pearson et al. (2006). Following the key are comparative notes for each species that discuss key characters and give specific information about their distribution, along with field photographs to illustrate the distinguishing characters.

Key to the Cicindelidia abdominalis species-group

1. Elytral surface covered with deep punctures, pronotum with dense decumbent setae (old specimens may have the setae rubbed off and the presence of setal punctures should be checked), usually with 6 labral setae . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

— Elytral surface (excluding presutural foveae) relatively smooth, with shallow punctures, pronotum glabrous or with fine pronotal setae, usually with 4 pronotal setae . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

2(1) Elytra black, with a post median marginal spot, usually with a vestige of a middle band, restricted to peninsular FL north of Miami-Dade County . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C. scabrosa (Schaupp)

— Elytra green or bronze-green, rarely with a post median marginal spot, and without evidence of a middle band, restricted to Miami-Dade County, FL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C. floridana (Cartwright)

3(1) Pronotum, and mes- and metepisternum glabrous, restricted to Polk and Highlands Counties, FL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C. highlandensis (Choate)

— Pronotum with fine decumbent setae, and mes- and metepisternum with decumbent setae, widespread across southeastern U.S. Coastal Plain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C . abdominalis (Fabricius)

Cicindelidia scabrosa—Scabrous Tiger Beetle

This species is largely limited to oak/pine scrub habitats in peninsular Florida north of Miami-Dade Co., although it does just sneak north of the border into souutheastern Georgia. From Cicindelidia abdominalis and C. highlandensis it can be distinguished by the distinctly punctured rather than smooth elytra and the presence of dense white setae along the lateral margins of the pronotum. From C. floridana it can be distinguished by the black rather than coppery-green coloration and the usual presence of a post-median spot along the lateral elytral margins. More information about this species can be found in my post, “The (almost) Florida-endemic Cicindelidia scabrosa.”

Cicindelidia scabrosa
Cicindelidia scabrosa | Levy Co., Florida

Cicindelidia floridana—Miami Tiger Beetle

Only recently rediscovered after being thought extinct for nearly a century, this species is most similar to C. scabrosa but is restricted to pine rockland habitat in Miami-Dade Co. where C. scabrosa does not occur. Like that species it exhibits the distinctly punctured rather than smooth elytra and dense white setae along the lateral margins of the pronotum that distinguish both species from C. abdominalis and C. highlandensis; however, its coloration is brilliant coppery green rather than black like C. scabrosa, especially in living individuals seen in the wild. More information about this species can be found in my posts, “Rediscovery of Cicindela scabrosa floridana” and “Photographing the Newly Rediscovered Cicindelidia floridana.”

Cicindelidia floridana
Cicindelidia floridana | Miami-Dade Co., Florida

Cicindelidia highlandensis—Highlands Tiger Beetle

This species is most similar to C. abdominalis, sharing with it the smooth elytra and glabrous pronotum that distinguish both species from C. scabrosa and C. floridana. Unlike that more widespread species, however, C. highlandensis is found only along a narrow band of sand scrub habitats on the Lake Wales Ridge in Polk and Highland Cos., central Florida, and it can be distinguished from it by the lack of white setae on the pronotum and mes- and metepisterna (lateral portions of the thorax above the middle and hind legs). More information about this species can be found in my post, “Highlands Tiger Beetle.”

Cicindelidia highlandensis
Cicindelidia highlandensis | Polk Co., Florida

Cicindelidia abdominalis—Eastern Pine Barrens Tiger Beetle

This is the only relatively broadly distributed species of the group, occurring in a variety of dry sand habitats along the southeastern U.S. Coastal Plain from New Jersey west to Louisiana and south into the northern half of Florida. Aside from its non-endemic distribution, this species can be distinguished from C. scabrosa and C. floridana by its smooth elytra and lack of dense white setae along the lateral pronotal margin, and from it’s most similar relative C. highlandensis by the presence of fine, decumbent (lying down) setae on the pronotum and on the mes- and metepisterna above the middle and hind legs. More information about this species can be found in my post, “Tiger Beetles Agree—It’s Hot in Florida!.”

Cicindelidia abdominalis
Cicindelidia abdominalis | Withlacoochee Co., Florida

REFERENCES:

Brzoska, D., C. B. Knisley, and J. Slotten. 2011. Rediscovery of Cicindela scabrosa floridana Cartwright (Coleoptera: Cicindelidae) and its elevation to species level. Insecta Mundi 0162:1–7.

Pearson, D. L., C. B. Knisley and C. J. Kazilek. 2006. A Field Guide to the Tiger Beetles of the United States and Canada. Oxford University Press, New York, 227 pp.

Copyright © Ted C. MacRae 2011

Return to Nowhere

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Back to some hard-core, field natural history.  Two years ago, on my virgin experience at collecting tiger beetles in Florida, I visited a spot called “Road to Nowhere”¹ at the suggestion of North American Tiger Beetle Master Dave Brzoska.  He said as many as 6–10 species can be seen there if the season is right, although my early August timing might be a tad late.  Despite having only a few hours from late afternoon to dusk to explore the area, I came close with the following five species: Cicindela trifasciata ascendens (Ascendent Tiger Beetle), Habroscelimorpha severa (Saltmarsh Tiger Beetle), Eunota togata togata (White-cloaked Tiger Beetle), Ellipsoptera marginata (Margined Tiger Beetle) and E. hamata lacerata (Gulf Beach Tiger Beetle) (see Tiger Beetles at Florida’s “Road to Nowhere”).

¹ For those of you who haven’t heard of the “Road to Nowhere,” it ranks as one of the top tiger beetle “hot spots” in the country (perhaps second only to Arizona’s famous Wilcox Playa).  According to Doug Taron at Gossamer Tapestry, the site—an expansive coastal salt marsh and mud flat along the isolated central Gulf Coast of Florida—was built some decades ago at the behest of corrupt state officials as a landing strip for small airplanes running drugs into this country.


One species I did not see on that trip is Habroscelimorpha striga (Elusive Tiger Beetle).  The common name is well deserved—the species is restricted to salt marshes, mud flats, and openings in coastal pine forest along the west and northeast coasts of Florida and South Carolina, and apparently nobody has ever seen it during the day (Pearson et al. 2006)!  Despite this, the Road to Nowhere is one place where the species can be seen somewhat reliably through its attraction to ultraviolet “blacklights.”  With this in mind, I began my 48-hour tiger beetle blitz during last August’s family vacation to Florida by timing my departure from St. Petersburg so that I arrived at the Road to Nowhere as dusk was falling—just in time to setup the lights, sit back with a beer, and wait for H. striga to cover the sheet!  The plan had a few kinks—I got a little bit of a late start, so by the time I got to Steinhatchee it was already getting dark.  Because of this, I missed one of the turns (my memory isn’t as good as it used to be) and got lost.  By the time I finally got my bearings, it was pitch black as I drove the 11-mile length of that lonely road through sand scrub and coastal marsh to a point where the road just simply stops.  Although the area is no longer used much for drug running, I still felt somewhat vulnerable as I setup the blacklight at the edge of the expansive salt mud flat.  There was one additional kink—I had forgotten to bring my copy of Pearson et al. (2006), any North American tiger beetle aficionado’s “Bible.”  Having only my memory of reading about the species to draw on, I hoped that I would recognize it if I saw it, or least recognize it as something different from the other species I expected to see there.


I’ve heard stories about the area being filled with tiger beetle collectors from all over the country with their blacklights and bucket traps, with someone yelling “striga!” every hour or so. However, I was the only person there that night. I hoped I wasn’t too late, as August is at the back end of the known adult activity period. Very quickly three other species, E. hamata lacerata, E. marginata and H. severa (the latter similar to H. striga, but much more abundant) began literally swarming all over the sheet and ground beneath. It was exciting at first, as I’d never encountered these (or any other tiger beetles) so abundantly at blacklights. In time, however, I satisfied my appetite for specimens and actually started becoming rather annoyed at their abundance—as if they might be “chasing away” the rare H. striga that was attracted to the light before I had a chance to see it.


Eventually, however, it happened. I spotted a somewhat different looking tiger beetle, but instead of yelling “striga!” my reaction was “What is that?” It was dark(ish), and I noted a subsutural row of green punctures on each elytron—”Is that punctulata?” I picked it up and looked at it closely, still thinking maybe punctulata but not sure. It was shinier, and a little bigger, and I noted the presence of marginal white spots at the middle and rear of the elytra. “No, that’s not punctulata… Is it striga? It must be striga! Yeah, it’s striga!” I dug down into the deep recesses of my memory and recalled that H. striga, indeed, was a darkish species, although I could not recall anything about the row of punctures. I finally decided that it really couldn’t be anything else but H. striga, an ID arrived at by process of elimination rather than recognition. Looking back, I feel a little cheated—I never got my “striga!” moment, that instant of sudden jubilation.  Instead, it was just a slow, creeping realization of what I had (listen to me—complaining about finding H. striga!).

I would actually find about a half dozen individuals of H. striga that night. The first one, per standard procedure, went live into a vial as a backup for studio photos if I didn’t manage to get any in the field.  That proved unnecessary, however, as I was able to photograph the two subsequent individuals shown in this post. It was not just H. striga that kept me busy with the camera, but feeding, perching, and trophy-bearing individuals of E. hamata lacerata and some other species that I have still to discuss as well. It was non-stop action from the time I setup the lights, interrupted only briefly at one point as I nervously watched a set of car headlights approach from the distance, stop a few hundred yards up the road, and then slowly turn around and disappear. By the time I finally took a moment to look at my watch it was already 1 a.m.! Soaking wet from the nighttime humidity, dirty from laying on the salty, muddy ground, and exhausted from the 4 hour drive and non-stop action after my arrival, I finally packed up the lights and began the drive back to civilization—praying that I would be able to find a motel without too much delay!

REFERENCE:

Pearson, D. L., C. B. Knisley and C. J. Kazilek. 2006. A Field Guide to the Tiger Beetles of the United States and Canada. Oxford University Press, New York, 227 pp.

Copyright © Ted C. MacRae 2011

Another account of the recently rediscovered Cicindelidia floridana

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Back in August I had the chance to see with my own eyes wild individuals of Cicindelidia floridana, a tiger beetle that had been recently rediscovered after being thought extinct for nearly a century.  Accompanying me during that trip were Chris Wirth (author of the tiger beetle blog Cicindela) and Dave Brzoska (tiger beetle collector extraordinaire, and lead author of the paper announcing the beetle’s rediscovery).  I recounted that experience in my post Photographing the Newly Rediscovered Cicindelidia floridana, and now Chris has done the same in his post Revisiting the recently rediscovered C. floridana.  Chris has perhaps the most perfect field photograph of one of these beetles—go check it out (and while you’re there read about his first trip to see the beetle in his post Presumed extinct, Floridian tiger beetle rediscovered after 73 years).  And so that you don’t leave here empty-handed, here is another photograph of the beetle that didn’t quite make the cut in my earlier post:

Cicindelidia floridana | Miami-Dade Co., Florida

Copyright © Ted C. MacRae 2011

Bee Fly Parasitism of Tetracha virginica

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I expected to gain a better understanding of insect photography principles and techniques at last weekend’s BugShot insect photography workshop at Shaw Nature Reserve in Gray Summit, Missouri.  I even expected that I would walk away from the event with some new friends.  The one thing I did not expect was the discovery of an apparently unreported host/parasitoid relationship amongst my beloved tiger beetles.  Nevertheless, that’s exactly what happened in a patch of barren soil just outside of the Dana Brown Education Center where the event was being held.

Tetracha virginica 3rd instar larva | Shaw Nature Reserve, Franklin Co., Missouri

I had spied the small cluster of tiger beetle burrows the previous day as we left on our first group hike.  The burrows were unmistakably those of Tetracha virginica (Virginia metallic tiger beetle) due to their size (no other tiger beetle in east-central Missouri approaches the size of this species), and in fact some of the larvae were seen sitting at the tops of their burrows.  Tetracha larvae are easily distinguished from other genera of North American tiger beetles (in addition to their size) by their distinctive white-margined pronotum.  I had to catch back up with the group but came back later in the day and took a few photographs of one of the larvae sitting in its burrow.  Some of the other BugShot attendees were there and wanted to take photographs, but the larvae dropped on their less-practiced approach.  No problem, I just “fished” a larva out of its burrow and let them take their photographs.  When they finished, I began taking my own photographs, but I only got off one shot before the larva suddenly made a bee-line for its burrow and dropped in before I could block its escape.  Oh well, I do already have photographs of the larva of this species from other locations.

Tetracha virginica 3rd instar larva | Shaw Nature Reserve, Franklin Co., Missouri

The next day I passed by the burrows again with Crystal and Lee.  I really wanted them to see the larvae, but they were not active.  No problem, I grabbed a long grass stem, chewed on one end, and inserted it to a depth of about 35 cm before it hit bottom.  A little jiggling to get the larva to bite, then a quick jerk back and out came the larva.  I never tire of seeing someone witness this for the first time—the way they jump back half-startled when they see the otherworldly larva flying through the air and landing on the grass.  I grabbed the larva and placed it on the barren clay to let them take photographs.  Crystal went first, and as she looked at the larva through her viewfinder she exclaimed, “there are wormy-things [the technical term, of course] on him.”  Lee and I looked, and sure enough there were two small “wormy-things” attached to the back of the tiger beetle.  I immediately recognized them as bee fly larvae (family Bombyliidae)—specifically Anthrax analis, the only bee fly known to parasitize tiger beetle larvae in the United States.  I was quite excited by this discovery, as I have never seen these before despite fishing untold numbers of tiger beetle larvae from their burrows over the past decade or so.  We all went camera crazy and took our turns photographing larvae and host, after which I popped it into a vial to keep for an attempt at rearing out the bee flies.

Anthrax analis larvae attached to abdomen of Tetracha virginica larva

It now seems that our find represents more than just a personal discovery, as bee flies—to my knowledge—have not yet been reported parasitizing any species of the genus Tetracha.  Of the 70 Anthrax spp. for which hosts have been recorded (Yeates and Greathead 1997), only three are known to parasitize tiger beetles.  Shelford (1913) gave the first account of A. analis (as Spogostylum anale) parasitzing Cicindela scutellaris lecontei, noting that the adult females lay their eggs by flying backward and downward while thrusting the abdomen forward until it touches the sand near the host burrow entrance.  Hamilton (1925) found Cicindelidia obsoleta parasitized by this species, and Bram and Knisley (1982) expanded its known host spectrum to include C. hirticollis, C. tranquebarica, Cicindelidia punctulata, and Ellipsoptera marginata.  Photographs of larvae (presumably of this species) parasitizing undetermined tiger beetle larvae can be seen in Pearson and Vogler (2001) and in this photo by Chris Wirth.  Anthrax gideon has been recorded parasitizing Pseudoxycheila tarsalis in Costa Rica (Palmer 1982) and Oxycheila trisis in Brazil (Arndt and Costa 2001), while a third undetermined Anthrax sp. has been reared from larvae of Pentacomia ventralis, also in Brazil (Arndt and Costa 2001).  Oxycheila and Pseudoxycheila are related to Tetracha at the tribal/subtribal level (depending on which classification you follow), so the finding of A. analis utilizing Tetracha is not unexpected.

Closer view of anteriormost Anthrax analis larva

The beetle larva and its unwelcome tagalongs is now in a container of native soil and has accepted the starter burrow that I made for it. Hopefully at least one of the bee fly larvae will complete its development and emerge as an adult to allow confirmation of its identity.  If this host association does turn out to be unreported, we will follow up with at least a short journal communication.  To that end, any literature citations you are aware of regarding bee fly parasitism of tiger beetles that is not listed below would be most welcome.

Congratulations to Ben Coulter, who wins yet another BitB Challenge with 14 points (this guy is a machine!), and Mr. Phidippus came close with 13 points.  Ben and Phiddy were the only participants that figured out the parasites were bee flies of the genus Anthrax, and Phiddy was the only participant to guess the correct genus for the host.  Ben’s win gives him a now commanding lead with 49 points in the current BitB Challenge Session #4 as we enter the home stretch.  Mr. Phidippus and Roy are still in striking distance with 39 and 28 points, respectively.  Is anybody capable of keeping him from his third title?  We shall see.

REFERENCES:

Arndt, E. and C. Costa.  2001.  Parasitism of Neotropical tiger beetles (Coleoptera: Carabidae: Cicindelinae) by Anthrax (Diptera: Bombyliidae).  Studies on Neotropical Fauna and Environment 36(1):63–66.

Bram, A. L. and C. B. Knisley.  1982.  Studies on the bee fly Anthrax analis (Bombyliidae), parasitic on tiger beetle larvae (Cicindelidae).  Virginia Journal of Science 33:90.

Hamilton, C. C. 1925. Studies on the morphology, taxonomy, and ecology of the larvae of Holarctic tiger beetles (family Cicindelidae).  Proceedings of the U.S. National Museum 65 (Art. 17):1–87.

Palmer, M. K.  1982.  Biology and behavior of two species of Anthrax (Diptera: Bombyliidae), parasitoids of the larvae of tiger beetles (Coleoptera: Cicindelidae).  Annals of the Entomological Society of America 75(1):61–70.

Pearson, D. L. and A. P. Vogler.  2001. Tiger Beetles: The Evolution, Ecology, and Diversity of the Cicindelids.  Cornell University Press, Ithaca, New York, 333 pp.

Shelford, V. E.  1913.  The life history of a bee-fly (Spogostylum anale Say) parasite of the larva of a tiger beetle (Cicindela scutellaris Say var. lecontei Hald.).  Annals of the Entomological Society of America 6(2):213–225.

Yeates, D. K. and D. J. Greathead.  1997. The evolutionary pattern of host use in the Bombyliidae (Diptera): a diverse family of parasitoid flies.  Biological Journal of the  Linnaean Society 60:149—185.

Copyright © Ted C. MacRae 2011