CHAPTER XII 
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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