Subject: Net winged beetle(?) + something
Geographic location of the bug: Abruzzo, Italy
Date: 05/14/2019
Time: 03:04 PM EDT
Your letter to the bugman: Hi Daniel
Last 2 for a while, if you don’t mind.
First one is, I suspect, a Net winged beetle of the Lycidae family.
The second, I have to admit, has me totally stumped. It doesn’t appear to be a True Bug, moth or butterfly and cannot find any images of beetles even remotely similar.
Your help would be very gratefully received.
Regards
How you want your letter signed: Fof
Dear Fof,
We quickly identified your Red and Black Froghopper, Cercopis vulnerata, thanks to Alamy and the British Bugs site where it states: “A truly unmistakable species, and one of our largest homopterans. The nymphs are rarely seen, as they feed on underground roots.” According to iNaturalist: “This species is present in most of Europe (Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, France, Greece, Spain, the former Yugoslavia, Moldova, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Switzerland, Hungary, Great Britain and Italy).” As with other Hemipterans that have mouths designed to pierce and suck, they might cause wilting of tender stems if they are plentiful, but a greater problem is the spreading of pathogens from plant to plant while they feed, based on what we found on EuroFresh. We never heard back from you after we identified your Common Picturewing from Vietnam.
