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Project Noah Nature School
Nerthra sp.
About 6 mm, this has an interesting story. When set upping my new nano vivarium I was having problems with the carpet of Pilea microphylla I'm trying to do. The younger seedlings were being decimated by some Oniscidea isopods—more precisely the Armadillidium vulgare, I believe. It was then that emerged from somewhere (probably came with the substrate that I used), a very friendly and fierce little guy who is now helping me to control the overpopulation of isopods. Most likely it is a hemipterous, very similar to those aquatic species that we have, but that lives on the ground .
State of Minas Gerais (rural area), Brazil.
It has a funny behavior. When it's running in hunting, walks of an intermittent way, thoroughly with short spaces as if it's searching for something (and certainly he is!). I've not had time to observe him very well, but I believe it should have more interesting things to discover about beyond the blatant I got today on watching him sucking a still little grey and tender Armadillidium cub. Sorry for the quality of the images. Still no proper camera to get good macros in dark environments!
Thank you very much for this suggestion, stho002!
Gelastocoridae for sure, popularly known as Toad Bug. Fantastic!
I found some more information about it and I figured it has semi-aquatic habits, marshy ground and yes, that's true.
I'll venture into identifying it as Nerthra sp. Nice! http://www.pbase.com/splluk/image/142630...
If anyone has another opnion, please let me know.
Thank you again for the valuable support, my friend!
Happy new year!
Spotted on Dec 31, 2013
Submitted on Dec 31, 2013
