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Photo#17749
Oiceoptoma  noveboracensis larva - Oiceoptoma noveboracense

Oiceoptoma noveboracensis larva - Oiceoptoma noveboracense
Hollis, Hillsborough County, New Hampshire, USA
May 19, 2005
Size: 12 mm
I found this active little guy climbing a foundation wall. Had to look twice to be sure he wasn't a sow bug relative. Fast, fluid roving motion, not at all like a lampyrid larva. He found something to eat on the velvet floor of my light arena. It looked like he was using his front legs to hold the crumb while he ate it -- whatever it was. Notice the round head too, quite unlike a lampyrid or lycid larva's.

By clever deduction ...

Today I visited a dead skunk that several weeks ago had been crawling with dozens of adult Oiceoptoma noveboracensis (orange on pronotum) but only one Oiceoptoma inaequalis (all black). It is now crawling with larvae that look like the one above.

But do the larvae of different species of Oiceoptoma look different or identical?

To answer that, I visited a dead turtle that had five O. inaequalis adults but no O. noveboracensis adults. The turtle had a number of similar-shaped larvae, but they lacked the handsome markings of the one pictured here. I'll shoot them and post their image later.

My thought is that O. noveboracensis prefers dead mammals and in northern states probably flies earlier in the year than O. inaequalis, which I surmise prefers dead reptiles that would only become available when the weather warms up.

(Since the turtle was pretty far gone, I placed its remains with a good-sized dead garter snake I found yesterday, in hopes that the beetles will hang around awhile longer. I have the snake outside in the open, but covered with a cage to keep it from being carried off by birds or mammals. I'm considering releasing some captive O. noveboracensis nearby tomorrow to see if any will visit the reptile remains.)

 
Reptiles yes!
Would O. noveboracensis would *ever* visit a reptile carcass? The answer is Yes!

May 22 I released 12 or 13 O. noveboracensis adults I had robbed from the skunk carcass about 50 ft. east of my reptile remains and a similar number about 50 ft. to the west.

Today I looked inside the turtle shell and there were three O. noveboracensis who had joined the O. inaequale already there. Next step I suppose would be to have competing bait stations, one with a mammal or bird carcass, and see if there is a clear preference.

 
O. inaequalis loves possum
I found a couple of dead young possums (perhaps drowned after a flood) in a ditch next to some woodlands here in NC. I covered them with old flowerpots. We had cool, rainy weather, but the next week (circa April 22) they had many O. inaequalis and Necrophila americana.

O. noveboracensis seems to be uncommon in my area--I've seen it but once, that on a pig put out for a forensics experiment. The two mentioned above also come to pig carcasses.

So, I don't know how picky these things are--it is hard to say.

 
I'll have to try it sometime,
possum that is :-)

Reminds us
of Matthew's carrion beetle larva

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