Common Beetles of our Countryside 



schonherri being quite 8 mm. long. It is easily known 

 by its appearance the elytra are black clothed with 

 pinkish grey scales, but these are wanting along the 

 suture and on two longitudinal lines or stripes on each 

 elytra, which give it the look of a pink grey beetle 

 striped with black ; the head and rostrum are black 

 and the thorax black with a few scattered greyish 

 scales, all rather closely punctured. There are also 

 lines of deep punctures in black on the elytra, and the 

 legs and antennae are quite black. 



The two other members of the genus Barynotus are 

 both large, heavy convex beetles, covered with grey 

 scales without any interrupting lines as in schonherri, 

 and are both more widely distributed and commoner 

 than is that species. 



One more capture we may add to the contents of our 

 bottle before we retrace our footsteps down the hill. 

 Like the last we might find it walking about or hidden 

 in the heather under some stone not deeply imbedded 

 in the ground. It is a rather large oval, almost cylin- 

 drical beetle, and as it lies quite motionless with head, 

 antennae and legs bent in close to the body it suggests 

 nothing alive. This is Byrrhus fasciatus (the banded 

 Byrrhus), Fig. 15, Plate V., and is supposed to own 

 in common with the other members of its genus the 

 popular name of " pill-ball beetles." Its size is 6 to 8 

 mm. long, its colour quite black, but clothed with 

 a very thick and close pubescence which may be either 

 a bronze-brown, grey, or dark brown-black ; there is a 

 variegated pattern of short darker lines, and slightly 



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