Anoplognathus porosus
6 Porosus Christmas beetle at Mount Ainslie
Identify this sighting
| Anoplognathus porosus | HaukeKoch | 13 Jan 2024 | |
| Anoplognathus brunnipennis | Pirom | 13 Jan 2024 |
Please Login or Register to identify this sighting.
Significant sighting
HaukeKoch noted:
15 Jan 2024
As far as I am aware, this is the first image documenting a pyrgotid fly (likely Maenomenus ensifer) in the act of parasitizing a Christmas Beetle.
User's notes
Christmas beetle with lurking (scarab?) fly
5 comments
13 Jan 2024
@pirom Don't think this is a Green-tailed but the fly looks very interesting. Hope you posted it separately.
13 Jan 2024
I’ll post the fly - been unable to ID. These beetles were with other individuals, more clearly Green-tailed, which I’ll post.
13 Jan 2024
The beetles in the first and second image are Anoplognathus porosus, third one is A. brunnipennis (probably that one should be deleted from this observation).
13 Jan 2024
The fly is super interesting, I think it definitely looks like Pyrgotidae, and the second image looks like it has bent its ovipositor under its body towards the beetle to oviposit. Looks quite like Maenomenus ensifer, which apparently has been observed to parasitise Anoplognathus before (http://www.faculty.ucr.edu/~legneref/identify/pyrgotid.htm). Never seen that myself though, very nice observation!
13 Jan 2024
I’ve added fly as sighting 4544201. Declining parasites get no love! Also deleted the errant photo - the two species were intermingled and fairly high confusing me. Thanks.
Location information
- Coordinates 149.161453-35.256061
- Maps Mount Ainslie
- Places Hackett, ACT
Sighting information
- 20 Abundance
- 13 Jan 2024 02:20 PM Recorded on
- Pirom Recorded by
- Eucalyptus sp. Associated plant
- 25mm to 50mm Animal size
- Breeding behaviour Breeding behaviour
- Alive / healthy Animal health
Collections
- Christmas beetles Photo Competition - Winners Significant Pirom Canberra & Southern Tablelands NatureMapr Anoplognathus porosus Scarab beetles (Scarabaeidae) Beetles (Coleoptera) Insects
Species information
- Anoplognathus porosus Scientific name
- Porosus Christmas beetle Common name
- Not Sensitive
- Local native
- Non-invasive or negligible
- Up to 816.39m Recorded at altitude
- External link More information
Record quality
Quality score
6 / 7
- Images or audio
- More than one media file
- Verified by an expert moderator
- GPS evidence of location
- Description
- Additional attributes
- Nearby sighting(s) of same species