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Project Noah Nature School
Distichocera fuliginosa
This beetle was exploring the stem of a small Kunzea shrub and, after some time, it stopped and began to 'wriggle'. She was laying reddish coloured eggs (pic 3) into a fault in the skin of the plant. About 40mm long body. This particular specimen is also quite exotic with one red antenna and one mostly black.
In a nature reserve adjacent to a large man-made reservoir.
The male of this species is smaller and has very 'feathery' (lamellate) antennae.
family: CERAMBYCIDAE
subfamily: CERAMBYCINAE
tribe: Distichocerini
http://bie.ala.org.au/species/urn:lsid:b...
Spotted on Nov 19, 2014
Submitted on Nov 19, 2014
4 Comments
I loved your egg laying observation. It's always useful to have a story to add some details to the field of knowledge of nature.
There is a butterfly laying eggs on my lime citrus as we speak.
Updated ID
Thanks Martin. I was extra pleased with the egg shots and a fairly attractive beetle as well.
A great observation Mark.
I saw a pair last year on flowers of Kunzea at Churchill NP.
The male offered an easy ID as the feather horned borer. It is shown in the series. http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/742...