Darkling Beetle Chemical defense

[dragonfire1577]

So I bought the desert beetle sampler from bugs in cyberspace and got some amazing beetles which I have been messing around with while moving them all into the enclosure when one of the beetles (looks like Eleodes acuticauda) got it's foot stuck in the enclosure door as I opened it, I immediately freed the beetle but was too late and although no damage was done to the bug I was too late to stop the beetle from employing its chemical defense and stinking up my whole room with an odor similar to that produced by a brown marmorated stink bug but a good 15 times stronger. I learned the hard way that it takes multiple hours for the smell from one of these guys to clear and now know not to mess with them haha.

 

[Tenevanica]

There's a reason Eleodes beetles are called stink beetles! I try not to mess with them too much. This doesn't ruin my love for the genus though, as it's probably one of the most diverse genera of beetles in the world.

 

[Hisserdude]

So I bought the desert beetle sampler from bugs in cyberspace and got some amazing beetles which I have been messing around with while moving them all into the enclosure when one of the beetles (looks like Eleodes acuticauda) got it's foot stuck in the enclosure door as I opened it, I immediately freed the beetle but was too late and although no damage was done to the bug I was too late to stop the beetle from employing its chemical defense and stinking up my whole room with an odor similar to that produced by a brown marmorated stink bug but a good 15 times stronger. I learned the hard way that it takes multiple hours for the smell from one of these guys to clear and now know not to mess with them haha.

To me it smells like insulin, though unless you are a diabetic you wouldn't know what that smells like lol! But yeah, they smell pretty bad if you pester them. Still, you gotta love them!

 

[dragonfire1577]

There's a reason Eleodes beetles are called stink beetles! I try not to mess with them too much. This doesn't ruin my love for the genus though, as it's probably one of the most diverse genera of beetles in the world.

See I hadn't had much time to research as It came as an unidentified random and I knew how to generally care for whatever species I got but didn't know the exact species or even genus of the beetles I got so wasn't prepared for the ability to use chemical defense and didn't locate the species until after it had done it. It was very surprising when I noticed what it had done and I will be more careful with it now but don't love it any less.

 

[Hisserdude]

See I hadn't had much time to research as It came as an unidentified random and I knew how to generally care for whatever species I got but didn't know the exact species or even genus of the beetles I got so wasn't prepared for the ability to use chemical defense and didn't locate the species until after it had done it. It was very surprising when I noticed what it had done and I will be more careful with it now but don't love it any less.

Wanna post some pictures of your unidentified darklings? I'm pretty sure I could identify them all at least to genus level. And I love seeing pics of darklings!

 

[dragonfire1577]

Sure I will post them asap

 

[dragonfire1577]

Here's the only one I haven't identified.

 

[dragonfire1577]

Here's another picture of the same beetle.

 

[Hisserdude]

It's a Nyctopris sp., probably N.carinata. Very cool darkling!

 

[dragonfire1577]

It's a Nyctopris sp., probably N.carinata. Very cool darkling!

I can't even find info on that genus lol how do you figure this stuff out.

 

[Hisserdude]

I can't even find info on that genus lol how do you figure this stuff out.

I love darklings beetles, I'll go to bugguide.net, and just look through all the darkling beetles and just memorize them all. I can now ID most American darklings at least down to genus level with relative ease! Here's bugguide's page on Nyctoporis:http://bugguide.net/node/view/134842 (I misspelled it on my first post. )