South American palm weevil
The South American palm weevil is a big black beetle with a long snout, like a tiny elephant's trunk. It sniffs out palm trees that are hurt. Its fat larvae then tunnel right into the soft heart of the palm.
How big is it?
How long is it?
How big is South American palm weevil compared to YOU?
Just maths in your browser. Nothing is saved or sent anywhere.
How fast is it?
Fun facts
Its larvae can grow even longer than the grown-up beetle, about 5 centimetres.
One mother can lay almost 700 eggs.
It can carry a tiny worm that makes palm trees sick with red ring disease.
The larva builds its cocoon out of palm fibres, like a little woven basket.
In South America, people have eaten the larvae for hundreds of years as a healthy snack.
Most asked questions about South American palm weevil
?What does the South American palm weevil eat?
Its larvae eat the inside of palm trees, like coconut and date palms, and sometimes sugar cane.
?Can you eat palm weevil larvae?
Yes. People in South America have eaten them for centuries because they are full of protein and vitamins.
?How big is the South American palm weevil?
The beetle is about 4 centimetres long, and its larvae can grow to about 5 centimetres.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Rhynchophorus palmarum
- Named by
- Linnaeus, 1758
- Group
- Beetles
- Family
- Curculionidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Coleoptera > Curculionidae
- Lives on
- South America, North America
Where the facts come from
- Rhynchophorus palmarum (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 Didier Descouens. CC BY-SA 3.0, 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.
Stag beetle
Hercules beetle
Common glow-worm
Goliath beetle
Cockchafer
Mealworm beetle
Peanut bug
Shocking pink dragon millipede
Emerald swallowtail
Julia butterfly
Morgan's sphinx moth
Anna's eighty-eight.jpg){kind=link}