A soldier beetle - English style.

Dowdy Leather-winged Beetle - A red and black soldier beetle.
The English soldiers, at the time of the US movement of independence, were known as "red coats."  They wore a mostly red jacket trimmed with black edging.  The soldiers donning the uniform were trained to be aggressive and fatal in their attack.  They must have looked at the dowdy leather-winged beetle and emulate its colouring and nature of attack.

Soldier beetles belong to the order Coleoptera and family Cantharidae of the Class Insecta.  Ok, that seems like Greek to you (Latin, actually), but the point is that soldier beetles are a distinct group of insects.  They are known to be avid consumers of insect pests; some also taking pollen and nectar.  Their antennae have 11 segments (count them for yourself) and are generally brightly coloured.  Larvae spend time on the ground, often hiding in leaf litter, waiting for prey to wander into their trap.  They also will search out food; the grubs can be very predaceous.  Soldier beetles are also ubiquitous, something the British could say about their military around the eighteenth century.

The dowdy leather winged beetle is known scientifically as Podabrus pruinosus.  They are voracious predators of aphids, caterpillars, and other destructive insects.  They supplement their diet with flower nectar and pollen.  Their young consume grasshopper eggs, small insects, and are themselves beneficial to gardeners as a whole.

I photographed this beetle beside a river on a flowering plant.  I used a full-frame DSLR camera equipped with a 105 mm macro lens fully extended and a pair of wirelessly activated macro flashes.  I used a shutter speed of 1/200th of a second (the fastest shutter speed when flash is used) with an aperture of f/45.  This is why the background behind the plant is so dark.  Sometimes I use a white object such as a sheet of paper or a paper plate as a background, but in this case, the beetle was nicely surrounded by the plant.

That's one of the things I appreciate about the English; they are always so helpful.

Thanks for reading.  www.ericspix.com   Eric Svendsen

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