CHAPTER XII 



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THE BEETLES (Order Coleoptera) 



HE moths and butterflies (Lepidoptera) and the 

 beetles (Coleoptera) are the most familiar of the 

 insect orders. They are, too, most affected by 

 collectors: of all the amateur collectors of insects 

 probably nine out of ten collect either Lepi- 

 doptera or Coleoptera, or perhaps both. The 

 moths and butterflies obviously owe their special 

 attractiveness to their beautiful colors and pat- 

 terns, and to the interesting metamorphoses 

 exhibited in their life-history. A gratifyingly 

 increasing number of amateurs and collectors are 



"rearing" or breeding Lepidoptera, and adding much to our scientific knowl- 

 edge of them. The beetles owe their place of honor among collectors largely 

 to their abundance of species and individuals, the readiness with which 

 they can be collected, and the little special attention necessary to their per- 

 fect preservation. They are mostly large enough, too, to be handled and 

 examined readily, and not so large as to require much cabinet space for 

 their keeping. They also make specially fit specimens for exchange. But 

 amateurs give almost no attention to the immature stages of beetles. 

 Although, like the Lepidoptera, they undergo a complete metamorphosis, the 

 larvae are so obscure and usually so concealed underground or in tree-trunks 

 or decaying matter or in the water, or, if seen, are so often unattractive and 

 even repulsive in appearance most beetle-larvae are "grubs" that rearing 

 beetles is practically an unknown pastime even with the professed "coleop- 

 terists." 



As a matter of fact, the beetles do not begin to present an interest even 

 to professional entomologists at all in proportion to the dominant number 

 of species in the order. There is a curious uniformity with of course the 

 startling exceptions which must be mentioned in the same breath with 

 almost any generalization about insects in the general character of the 

 structure, development, and habits throughout most of the great order of 

 beetles. So that a few life-histories well worked out give us a fair knowledge 

 of the principal characteristics of coleopterous development. 



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