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Photo#82459
Pill Beetle - Simplocaria semistriata

Pill Beetle - Simplocaria semistriata
Nashua, Hillsborough County, New Hampshire, USA
October 9, 2006
Size: 3.2 mm
This beetle landed near me in a residential neighborhood and found its way into my pocket vial. Something about its features (pointy pygidium, broad stria, stippled surface, medium-long semi-decumbent setae, plus the antennae of course) makes me think it might belong to a family I haven't collected before.

Images of this individual: tag all
Pill Beetle - Simplocaria semistriata Pill Beetle - Simplocaria semistriata Pill Beetle - Simplocaria semistriata

Moved
Moved from Pill Beetles.

Byrrhidae: Simplocaria semistriata
This is our low elevation-southern NH species, and your photo fits it well. Simplo. tesselata seems to be restricted to the alpine areas of the White Mountains.

 
Excellent!
Thank you so much for checking on this, Don. I found a photo of one that also agrees well with this one. Funny, with a name like semistriata I would have expected the stria to peter out about halfway down the elytra.

By strange coincidence I found my second Byrrhid today, a different species that had been crushed between stacked pieces of old vinyl siding. It would have been IDable and cooperative but not otherwise a good photo subject, so I didn't save it.

 
adventive sp.
evidently from Europe.

Moved
Moved from Byrrhus tesselatus.

Moved
Moved from Beetles.

Byrrhidae
Only family that comes to mind.

 
Yes, that would be a new family for me :-)
It has strong affinities at least. I want to research a little more before moving it there. In the meantime, Don Chandler might take a peek and recognize one of his New Hampshire flock.

If it is one, it is neither of the two species already posted here. That leaves 10 species as possibilities listed for New Hampshire on Don's checklist.

Okay, I've done some research and I think I've found a match in Byrrhus tesselatus, listed as Simplocaria tessellata on Don's UNH checklist for New Hampshire (see above link).

 
Not Byrrhus
but it does look like a Byrrhid. The "Byrrhus" tesselatus placement has to be pretty old. It is not a Byrrhus, they are all about 1 cm long. It could be Simplicaria tessellata from what I remember, but I thought they were a bit bigger. If I have time I will try to look tomorrow - but the "Byrrhus" placement is not correct.
Just checked your link, and many of the types figured in the MCZ collection have since changed their generic assignments. It doesn't look quite right for LeConte's type that is figured, and could be something else.

 
note on MCZ
If you go to the main MCZ search page and input Byrrhidae in the "Name:" line - you'll get 21 results with two columns - the original (as described) species name and a column for 'current' name (well ...). If you actually access any of those - only the original species name appears with the figures, not the current name. You'll see this for the case you mention. For the species name Byrrhus tessellatus LeConte, 1850, the current name column shows Simplocaria tessellata (may be current, may not be, don't know how often these are updated) - if you access the images - you see them labeled Byrrhus tessellatus - makes sense.

 
Yes
In fact, I arrived at the Byrrhus tesselatus images on a google search for Simplocaria tesselata.

 
a Googler
I don't understand how Google determines which searches produce image results. I just Googled "Simplocaria tesselata" for "image" - got nothing, but of course there are images available on the MCZ site which comes up using "web" search.

The current name column is a good idea, but is quite unevenly populated.

 
Ah,
mine wasn't an image search.

 
Good!
I'll move it back to family for now. Thanks, Don.

 
have you seen
this site? Has Key and Checklist that looks current.