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Long-Horned Wood Boring Beetle

Cirrhicera sallei

Photo by LaurenZarate
Published on Project Noah
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16.7065, -92.8578

Field Notes

Description:

This is a most unusual Long-Horn Beetle that I have never seen before. It is black with bottle brush antennae and large yellow and white spots. The beetle was about 1 cm long. Family Cerambycidae.

Habitat:

Heavy shrubbery and forest along the highway between San Cristobal de Las Casas and Tuxtla Gutierrez, km 11.5, 865 meters.

Notes:

This species with a somewhat different coloring has been spotted in Costa Rica by both Pamsai and Gilma:
http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/73426165/fullscreen http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/53166040/fullscreen

Reference Links:

Specimens | Cirrhicera nigrina (Thomson, 1857) | Beetles - Cerambycidae | Esper…

Species ID Suggestions

Long-Horned Wood Boring Beetle

Cirrhicera nigrina

Reference Link
Jacob Gorneau
2

Comments (17)
pamsai
Nice Lauren. Interesting how colours differ from region to region. And it looks a little fatter than the ones we saw in Costa Rica. Great photo, by the way...
LaurenZarate
Thank you so much Jacob, I will contact your link and see what they think.
Jacob Gorneau
Hi Lauren, sorry for the late response. I did see Cirrhicera sallei, and thought that might be it looking at your first photo. I thought maybe the lighting made the elytra seem blackish when C. sallei is brown. Then, when I looked at your other photos in this spotting, the color of the elytra was consistently black, with some brownish tones on photos two and three. Looking back at the Esperanza Insects link, it looks like that one has some brown tones as well. That being said, I think you are correct. I don't think there is enough information to back up an ID of C. nigrina, but C. sallei looks like a very good possibility. I first looked at the Coleoptera Neotropical site, but wasn't satisfied with C. sallei. It may be valuable reaching out to them by email, [email protected].
LaurenZarate
Martin, it seems like a very good hypothesis....makes a lot of sense that it have a functional use. A bit of laboratory observation and chemical analysis would be a fun thing to do.
MartinL
My suspicion is based partially on this behavior in the Danaus butterflies, as I imagine you are well aware. The hind-wing sex brand in males is a small pouch containing a pheromone gland. The male has anal brushes which exactly reach this pheromone reservoir to assist dispersal. Kind of the reverse of our cerambycid hypotheses.
LaurenZarate
Thank you Martin. The antennal tufts have always been a fascination! I hadn't noticed the coordination between the antennae and the tip of the abdomen. I've been looking if there is any known function for these tufts (other than sexual enhancement?) but no one seems to really know what they are for. See this link (scroll down to the second beetle): http://beetlesinthebush.wordpress.com/2013/04/23/group-mimicry-in-cerambycidae-and-more/
MartinL
That's a lot of work to document one specimen, Lauren. Nicely done. I wonder why the brush antennae evolved into that structure. Could they be used to spread pheromones as some other insects do. The brushes seem to react their abdomen tip which may be the source of pheromones.
LaurenZarate
Hi Jacob. I've been doing a bit more checking on this species. The Mexican link of Cerambycids has Cirrhicera sallei as the one that looks like mine and then I found two more on the second link below that also look like mine (with a bit of differences). One is from Nicaragua and the other from Panama. Both are now at the Calif. Academy of Sciences in San Francisco so I think the real ID must be C. sallei. I think the beetle selling place has the wrong ID. What do you think? http://www.coleoptera-neotropical.org/paginas/2_PAISES/Mexico/Cerambycidae/lamiinae-Hemilophini-mex.html http://plant.cdfa.ca.gov/byciddb/details.asp?id=12908
LaurenZarate
Wow Jacob! Can't believe you found the identification! It is certainly very similar to the one in the link. A link that sells beetles no less! They list it as very rare. The picture I found for Cirrhicera nigrina on this Mexican link: http://www.coleoptera-neotropical.org/paginas/2_PAISES/Mexico/Cerambycidae/lamiinae-Hemilophini-mex.html doesn't look like it at all. Certainly there isn't much known about it. My husband saw it on Aug 2nd 2013 and it flew away before he got more than one photo. We went back 3 times looking for it (even at night with flashlights) and finally found it on the 12th of August just by luck. It is such an amazing beetle.
Jacob Gorneau
Fantastic, Lauren! Cerambycidae, Cirrhicera sp., looks most like C. nigrina, though there are some subtle difference on the photo in the link, but I can't find many complete sources for this genus.

Spotted for Missions

Mission
Mexico Horn of Plenty
Mission
Beetles!
Mission
National Geographic's Great Nature Project
Mission
Longhorn Beetles (Global)

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PublishedSeptember 1, 2013

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