Why is this beetle ignored?

[Gill Catton]

why not devil's coach horse the name's practically the same much smaller though

[Lori]

Thank you so much for the posts.

In bed last night I kept thinking could I have misjudged size? I dithered around for a while wondering until I got up and checked the ruler again and now I'm convinced I haven't over estimated it at 2 inches. When I first saw it as a child I thought it was a small toy until I saw it was moving.

I know I'm opening myself up to raised eyebrows with the following but truth often stranger than fiction. In discussion with my husband last night he remembered my comment years ago that it looked like a scaled down furniture removalists van. His other comment that might bring the eyebrows down was that he is rather surprised that I've persevered for so long with this beetle, especially living as we do among many mighty specimens of the insect and spider world here in Australia.

The fact is, the beetle impressed initially due to its size, later it was curiosity about its natural habitat etc.. It looked so unsuited for survival, almost as though designed to fail in every way without factoring in human interference. Australian insect life in contrast is amazingly well armed to survive. On the other hand, South London had been overcrowded for a couple of centuries, he survived the terrible winters we had then and the Blitz (he had his own air raid shelter) I'm desperately trying to remain optimistic.

I've posted in Se1 but haven't checked there yet.

I'm off to look up your recommendations. Thank you again for the help I really do appreciate it.

Lori

[Lori]

I'm almost too excited to type.

Checked out the beetles, no luck.

Went into Se1 forum and there was this post

^^^^^^

Jan the old one Thursday 12 June 2008 1.05pm
and now very rare I have been told, the first time i saw one i thought it was a plastic toy, i put it safely in shrubbery.

^^^^^^

I've written to Jan asking for more details via email and that she post a description on the Se1 forum site.

I'm trying not to get my hopes up too much but extraodinary that she thought the beetle a toy too! My fear is that Jan may have seen a totally different large beetle but its the first glimmer of hope in years!

Everyone keep their fingers crossed for me.

Lori

[Lori]

My messages have gone astray. Here are some copies from Notepad.

Thank you so much for the posts.

In bed last night I kept thinking could I have misjudged size? I dithered around for a while wondering until I got up and checked the ruler again and now I'm convinced I haven't over estimated it at 2 inches. When I first saw it as a child I thought it was a small toy until I saw it was moving.

I know I'm opening myself up to raised eyebrows with the following but truth often stranger than fiction. In discussion with my husband last night he remembered my comment years ago that it looked like a scaled down furniture removalists van. His other comment that might bring the eyebrows down was that he is rather surprised that I've persevered for so long with this beetle, especially living as we do among many mighty specimens of the insect and spider world here in Australia.

The fact is, the beetle impressed initially due to its size, later it was curiosity about its natural habitat etc.. It looked so unsuited for survival, almost as though designed to fail in every way without factoring in human interference. Australian insect life in contrast is amazingly well armed to survive. On the other hand, South London had been overcrowded for a couple of centuries, he survived the terrible winters we had then and the Blitz (he had his own air raid shelter) I'm desperately trying to remain optimistic.

I've posted in Se1 but haven't checked there yet.

I'm off to look up your recommendations. Thank you again for the help I really do appreciate it.

Lori

^^^^^^^

These are posts from Se1 forum. I headed up my question as "Mystery Box' to get as many people to veiw it as possible since beetles are not many peoples cup of tea.


Tolstoy Thursday 12 June 2008 7.32am
Your sure this isn't the common Stag Beetle? I had one of these sitting on my shoulder once unbeknown to me until I turned my head. Beautiful creature but not up that close, scared the life out of me, they're big!
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Jan the old one Thursday 12 June 2008 1.05pm
and now very rare I have been told, the first time i saw one i thought it was a plastic toy, i put it safely in shrubbery.
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London Aye Thursday 12 June 2008 8.30pm
If it is a stag beetle you're referring to, then I remmeber them when I used to live in Herne Hill (SE24) when I was a child some 20 years ago. They used to come out of Brockwell Park on warm Summer nights and saunter along my road. I haven't seen one in this country since then but I saw one in France a few years back. Shame they're an endangered species.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

I've written to Jan to get more details via private message and to ask her to post again on site. I'm keeping my fingers crossed. It does look promising so wish me luck.

Lori

[Lori]

It wasn't my beetle.

Devastated and temporarily depressed but not ready to surrender.

Lori

[derelict]

I thought initially of lesser stag beetles but that one has already gone... they don't look 'diabolical' to me though... they can look like toys though and they rear up which can give the illusion of height.

A problem with popular identification books is that they tend to only show the dorsal view and this can limit the impression of the insect as a three-dimensional beastie - some are much more 3-D than others.

It's extremely unlikely to be a bona fide DCH for the simple reason that no-one who doesn't know about beetles would willingly pick one up! As for their larvae... (!)

But trying to think of big black beetles that you don't see any more in towns...

Geotrupes dung beetles - 'dors' - remember there are nowhere near as many horses around now as there were then .... possible one of the largest Aphodius spp e.g. rufipes but I also quite like the idea of Sinodendron cylindricum because that's got quite a memorable 3-D structure and has reminded me of a small tank before ... and woodboring spp tend to be seasonal ... it's a bit small for your spec though.

Another thing it might be (given all the small furry animals) is a burying beetle - probably Nicrophorus humator - that's black, often quite large and a very 3 dimensional beetle. I have to say that some of the photos I've just looked at on the WWW don't really do this animal justice.

[Lori]

I'm stumped. I've veiwed U Tube. I've looked at the Goliath beetle before on several occasions but seeing them close up, active, and very importantly side on was interesting. My beetle was more box shaped, however, like the Goliath, mine was mostly body with a small head which is why I wasn't worried about picking him up. I think I would remember if it had been horned like the rhino beetle and certainly the body wasn't half taken up with head as with this species and many others I veiwed. I wish now I'd taken a better look at his anatomy that time when I picked him up but I was on my way to the vets with a very pregnant cat in a basket. I've also noted that the Goliath is mentioned as a heavy beetle. Mine wasn't, considering his size and bulky look he was very light.

There were absolutely no wings visible on my beetle, however, the first time I saw him it was in a longish dead end alley, well walled off on two sides and a block of Peabody Buildings on the other. It was all concrete and brick. There was a bombsite behind the wall but it would have been impossible for the beetle to have scaled the wall with his bulky body and weedy legs. My Granny lived in one of the flats and when visiting Mum could keep an eye on me playing below from her window. Its difficult to imagine such a creature flying but...

I appreciate that the beetles I'm seeing on sites are mostly subtropic or tropical varieties. Lower Marsh Market was in our neighbourhood about a 10 minute walk away also a few individual greengrocer/fruit shops. One sighting could be put down to it being an accidental exotic import but I saw it three times over a period of about 15 years, admittedly each time was in high Summer which would aid survival a little but I think its pushing the realms of possibility a bit too far.

Se1 folk have been very kind as have you guys. I still have several links left in private message bin to go though but I check this sites offerings first as other people tend to send rare species even if tiny and without real regard to my admittedly rough description.

Lori

[Pudding4brains]

Well, it's fun looking big beetles on the net so I'll give it another go

If we're including "exotics" and looking for big (you'll have to excuse me for including some options smaller than 1 foot) and boxy without scary horns and pincers, maybe these are an option?:

Very "Devils horse coach" like if you ask me
- Genus Coprophanaeus => telamon, rigoutorum or chabrillacii!!!
- Genus Diabroctis
- Genus Heliocopris
- Genus Phanaeus => milon

Not quite as 'high', but certainly boxy:
- Genus Scarabaeus
- Genus Kheper
- Genus Pachylomera
- Genus Geotrupes
- Genus Gonopus
- Genus Morica
- Genus Typhaeus
- Genus Pimelia

Not very boxy:
- .. but huge Berberomeloe majalis
- or genus Meloe

Okay, after this I'll let you have your rest again

Cheers, Arp

[Coley]

Just a shot in the dark, could it be this one?
Excuse me while I go a little Buggy! « …free your imagination…
or this one?
http://www.inra.fr/opie-insectes/obs...re/rv-typh.jpg

[Lori]

Firstly I must thank you, Coley, Pudding and Derelict.

Secondly, I must stress that I truely did see the big boxy beetle and have tried my utmost to be honest.

Now I have to confess something. I'm now beginning to think I may have sort of brainwashed myself in regard to the head looking like that of the Goliath. I kept going back to one of the frames where you get a front on view and the more I looked at it the more familiar it looked. I know police can influence a persons memory by giving them the facts and gradually getting the person to fit them selves into somehow and I think I did that to myself. The truth is I can't remember the head of the beetle. It certainly didn't have elongated horns although I appreciate it had something there, I just can't picture it.

I was going to post last night after looking through your beetles which were really exciting although not right for my beetle. It was very late and I was exhausted, so I went to bed.

I lay there thinking about the first time I saw the beetle and remembered that I had no idea what it actually was. If Mum hadn't come down to look and tell me it was a beetle I wouldn't have known although I had seen many beetles by then. I believe my beetles head was either well disquised as part of the whole or very small and shielded. That would be more accurate. Also it had a distincty oblong shape without the decided roundness of so many beetles. On the last time when I picked it up, I did so with a thumb and finger holding the carapace easily because of this angularity. The beetles I've viewed are almost without exception easily recognisable as beetles no matter how large they are. This wasn't, it was entirely black, the dull black of some of those viewed, entirely without shine. It had no lines on the wing section and no wings visible at all. I see how well the wings are integrated on the back some and could have been fooled. I would have remember any scalloped edges on the head. It obviously had no colour on the antenna ends or brown hairs visible on the underside, these I would have remembered. I have seen a beetle which I can't find now which has a head joined to the the body without much division and a head that is almost the same size as the body without much paraphernalia adorning it. It wasn't my beetle, it was too squat and square however, I think the head may have been something like that.

The reason I'm pointing out this glitch with the head is that I still have hopes of this little chap turning up somewhere in London. I don't want my subconcious mind slotting in details when can't actually remember facts and therefore looking like an over imaginative fool when he resurfaces.

My mother will be home in the UK on the 20th, I've had no email back from my sister who I asked to quiz Mum on the beetle. I'll ring her a day or two after she returns and hope to goodness she remembers the beetle.

I will check out any site you guys suggest. Its lovely to hear that any creature thought extinct has been refound, maybe we'll be lucky!

Lori