| Scientific Name |  Click photo to enlarge. Photo by Charles Staines. |
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| Hydrochara soror Smetana - ATBI Database: Specimen Records | |||||
| Common Name | |||||
| N/A | |||||
| Kingdom | Phylum | Class | Order | Family | |
| Animalia | Arthropoda | Insecta | Coleoptera | Hydrophilidae | |
| Animals | Arthropods | Insects | Beetles | Water Scavenger Beetles | |
Physical characteristics:
Adult: Large; broadly oval; very convex. Color: black, dorsal surface shining, with feeble to distinct dark green metallic luster; antennae reddish-brown, club sometimes darkened; palps reddish-brown, last segment darkened; venter reddish-brown; legs piceous, tarsi paler. Pronotum: feebly bisinuate at base; anterior angle obtuse; lateral margin moderately arcuate. Elytron: serial punctures distinct; lateral bead wide, bordered by single irregular row of punctures. Venter: prosternal carina moderately long to long, often with dent posteriorly; metasternal portion of sternal keel no more than feebly dilated. (Smetana 1980)
Adult body length: 14.0-19.0 mm.
Larvae: Color: dirty-brown, except head and thorax; venter slightly paler. Head: almost rectangular, slightly tapering from base of mandibles to posterior margin; with 6 ocelli; antennae 3-segmented, segment 1 nearly four times as long as 2 and 3 combined; mandibles long, tapering, with large medial tooth and smaller submedial blunt tooth. Pronotum: wider than long. Abdomen: 8-segmented, segments 9 and 10 reduced; segments 1-7 with transverse folds; segment 8 with quadrate sclerotized plate. (Matta 1982)
Larval body length : 25.0 mm.
Distribution
Global
This species is known from Connecticut to Florida , west to Minnesota , Kansas , and Texas (Smetana 1980).
Park
This species has been collected in flooded meadows in Cataloochee in May and June.
Natural history
Habitat
Matta (1982) reported this species from woodland pools, either shaded or unshaded. Hydrochara soror has also been found in ponds, streams, ditches, shallow margins of lakes, and salt marshes (Ciegler 2003); in thick grassy vegetation in roadside pools and grassy bottoms of small woodland pools (Testa & Lago 1994). Adults are attracted collected to lights (Smetana 1980).
Conservation Biology
This species is common, widespread, and not globally threatened.
Acknowledgements
Text:
Charles Staines.
Photographs:Charles Staines.
References
Ciegler, J. C. 2003. Water beetles of South Carolina (Coleoptera: Gyrinidae, Haliplidae, Noteridae, Dytiscidae, Hydrophilidae, Hydraenidae, Scirtidae, Elmidae, Dryopidae, Limnichidae, Heteroceridae, Psephenidae, Ptilodactylidae, and Chelonariidae). Biota of South Carolina . Volume 3. Clemson University , Clemson. 207 pp.
Matta, J.F. 1982. The bionomics of two species of Hydrochara (Coleoptera: Hydrophilidae) with descriptions of their larvae. Proceedings of the Entomological Society of Washington 84:461-467.Smetana, A. 1980. Revision of the genus Hydrochara Berth. (Coleoptera: Hydrophilidae). Memoirs of the Entomological Society of Canada 111:1-100.
Testa, S. & P. K. Lago. 1994. The aquatic Hydrophilidae (Coleoptera) of Mississippi . Mississippi Agricultural & Forestry Experimental Station Bulletin 193:1-71.
