Harlequin beetle
The harlequin beetle is a big rainforest beetle with a fancy pattern of black, orange-red and yellow-green. Big males have amazingly long front legs, longer than their whole body. Even with all those colours, it is hard to spot on a mossy tree trunk.
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Fun facts
A big male's front legs can be 15 centimetres long, twice as long as a female's.
Males use their long legs to push other males off fallen trees, where the females lay their eggs.
It can smell a freshly fallen tree from the sap that pours out of it.
It flies mostly at night and is attracted to lights.
It is the only member of its genus, so it has no close cousins.
Most asked questions about Harlequin beetle
?Is the harlequin beetle dangerous?
No, it is harmless to people, but it can bite if it is grabbed.
?How big is the harlequin beetle?
Its body is 4.3 to 7.5 centimetres long, and a big male's front legs can be 15 centimetres long.
?Where does the harlequin beetle live?
In the forests of tropical America, from Mexico to Argentina.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Acrocinus longimanus
- Named by
- Linnaeus, 1758
- Group
- Beetles
- Family
- Cerambycidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Coleoptera > Cerambycidae
- Lives on
- North America, South America
Where the facts come from
- Harlequin beetle (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by Werner Rose. CC BY-SA 2.0 de, Wikimedia Commons. The round sticker of this bug is cut from the same picture.
If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at hello@bugwiki.app and we will fix it.
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