Caraça Tiger Beetles

January 27, 2010 | Caraça Natural Park, Minas Gerais, Brazil

I encountered a handful of these tiger beetles. At least, I think that’s what these are. I hope I don’t embarrass myself.

Most of them were up in trees and bushes as suggested by the first photo. I only encountered one on the ground.

From a distance, I mistook the first one for a large ant. Indeed, they move more like an ant than what I expect from a tiger beetle. I believe they may in fact be mimicking ants, and I found some references to back that up. None gave even a general identification though, so I wasn’t able to search for any online photos.

I led with that first photo above because it was the best specimen. Most of the ones I encountered were missing legs or antennae.

None of my photos turned out all that well. There was just too much contrast between the highlights and the dark body.

In this final photo, I was trying to show from a distance how they might be mistaken for an ant.

Look at the full-size image and you’ll see this one has a little hitchhiking mite.

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11 Responses to Caraça Tiger Beetles

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