Pie Dish Beetle is no longer Unknown Australian Darkling Beetle

can’t rest until I know
It’s Christmas Day ’06… Merry Christmas! I live close to Perth in Western Australia and I have always had a fascination with all manner of bugs, but today I came across one that really caught my attention and I have never come across in all my almost 44 years on this amazing Earth! I have this problem where I can’t rest until I know what a thing is that captures my interest so and this is why I am sending these photos to see if you can help me? I checked out your wonderful beetle pic collection, but did not see it there. If you can tell what sex it is I’d also be interested in that, but mainly just what it is called. I know you’re busy.. but it’s your own fault for having such a great site. Thanks in advance,
Jill

Hi Jill,
We have been researching on the internet for the past hour and have nothing conclusive for you. Our first inclination, really just a guess, is that this is some species of Carrion Beetle in the family Silphidae. A google search lead us to an image of Ptomaphila perlata that is somewhat similar, but definitely not a species match. We are calling in the big guns with Eric Eaton to see if he at least agrees with the general identification of a Carrion Beetle. Each image we opened was more interesting than the last, so we are posting three in the hopes that some reader can give both you and us a conclusive identification as we will have trouble resting as well. Here is what Eric Eaton believes: “I’m pretty sure this is a darkling beetle in the family Tenebrionidae. It resembles our American genus Embaphion, in fact. Eric”

(12/27/2006)
I can rest because now I know It’s a type of pie dish beetle! Thank you for your time… I should have mentioned that the bug in question was about an inch long by half an inch wide… quite large really!
Jill

Ed. Note:  Pie Dish Beetle
January 30, 2010
We are doing some housecleaning and recategorizing some of our archive entries, and we found a broken link which we fixed.  The Pie Dish Beetle is Pterohelaeus cornutus or Pterohelaeus piceus.  The species is also known as a False Wireworm.

Correction: January 11, 2011
In researching a new posting today, we believe we have identified this Hairy Backed Pie Dish Beetle as Helea perforata on FlickR.