Beetle round-up: Little Assynt and Nedd
Three interesting beetles came to our notice during the latter half of 2021.
Little Assynt
On 7th July, Gwen was walking the Loop Path on Little Assynt (NC1525/1526) when she spotted small ragged holes in the leaves of alders Alnus glutinosa planted on this site. Near the holes were small brown beetles, about 5 mm long (photo 1), and elsewhere clusters of eggs they had laid (photo 2).
They were later identified as the Brown Willow Beetle Galerucella lineola. This is one of the leaf beetles (Chrysomelidae) whose larvae feed on the leaves of willows, poplars and alders. Since our knowledge of local beetles is quite patchy, it was no surprise to find that there are no records of G. lineola in NBN from the North-West.
Nedd
On 28th October Ian found a large black beetle, about 20mm long, clinging to the wire mesh of his deer gate at Nedd (NC137319). It had the look of a carrion beetle (Silphidae) and was in fact a Shore Sexton Beetle Necrodes littoralis (photo 3). Characteristic features are the black colouration, apart from orange-tipped antenna, and sharply-ridged wing-cases.
A few metres away, under a large bush, there was the carcase of one of the sheep that roam Nedd, which had died about a week previously and been covered with a pile of earth. When this was examined on 31st October, some of the earth had been scraped off (possibly by badgers); the exposed parts were heaving with examples of this beetle (photo 4).
Strictly speaking, N. littoralis is not a sexton or burying beetle, since the bodies it favours are too large to bury. The adults actually predate fly larvae which infest carrion, and their shiny appearance may facilitate movement in rather gungy surroundings. They are reputed to be able to find their way to carrion from a considerable distance.
There are, again, no records of N. littoralis from the North-West in NBN, although the adults are attracted to moth traps. Ian suspects that he had them when he was regularly trapping at Nedd.
On 24th December, Benjamin McTaggart was helping Ian in his vegetable garden at Nedd when he found a shiny brown beetle, about 8mm long, hunkered down beside the path. This was later identified as a Brown Mint Beetle Chrysolina staphylea (photo 5), another leaf beetle. Its name fits, since there is a large patch of apple mint Mentha x villosa within a couple of metres.
Previous Records of C.staphylea
There are previous local records of C. staphylea from: Loch Assynt (NC22, July 1914, A.Thornley and J.W.Carr); Clashnessie (NC067316, 29/5/2009, IME); Inverkirkaig (NC092189, 16/8/2009, GR) and Culkein Drumbeg (NC113336, 8/1/2014, David Haines), but no other records in NBN from the North-West. It is not a rarity elsewhere, but leaf beetles are attractive and often host specific, so well worth recording.
Ian M. Evans and Gwen Richards