Box Elder Bug
Running a bug website changes people; I have learned to carry my camera with me everywhere, “just in case”. Just in case I see a bug? Well, yes, but more importantly, just in case I’m visiting a friend and they say “Hey, let’s go see if there are any bugs in my back yard for your website!” A couple of weeks ago I was visiting my good friend Don, and he said just this thing. It was after the snow and several cold snaps so I wasn’t particularly hopeful, but no sooner had we stepped out onto the porch but there was this hardy little box elder bug bravely soaking up the meager rays of Autumn sunlight.
I love the bicolor contrast on this bug. If you look at the high-resolution image, for example, there are two red bumps between its eyes, and even the joint of its knee has a flash of red in it.
Athena said,
November 29, 2007 @ 1:35 pm
Soo… I took a picture of a very similar bug we see up here that I was going to send you. So I have two questions:
1. Is Box Elder a ‘nickname’ of sorts, of which there are more than one for this bug? (Ok, I know it’s not the scientific name, but… yeah, is there more than one nickname?) ‘Cuz I know there’s a Box Elder county in Utah, but they have always been quite populous up here too! (WA state)
2. Did yours have a bright red underbelly? Or are they not actually the same bug and I should send you my pics anyway? (Maybe just relatives?)
I hate these, btw… Mostly because they flock… but something about the red gets me too. I guess that’s usually the point with brightly colored bugs. LOL
David Brady said,
November 29, 2007 @ 1:39 pm
Hi Athena!
Box Elder bugs get their name from a common food plant–they like to suck the sap out of buds on box elder trees. They eat other trees, too, but got their name from box elders. Lots of bugs get their names from their food or nesting plant, like the Locust Borer I posted a while back.
They vary wildly in coloration. Go to bugguide.net and search for “Box Elder Bug” (Here’s a direct link) and you’ll see some nearly entirely black and some that are nearly all red. The ones here in Utah are predominantly the color depicted in the photo.
Kazriko said,
November 29, 2007 @ 2:01 pm
These are exactly like the ones we commonly see her in west colorado too. IIRC, their abdomen under their wings is also a bright red.
Also IIRC, I was bitten by these a few times in Paradox. Nasty little critters. I make an effort to kick them into spider webs whenever I can.
David Brady said,
November 29, 2007 @ 2:06 pm
Kazriko: Really! I get such mixed reports about box elder bugs, alternating between “they are utterly harmless” and “they have a wicked painful bite”.
I’ve always felt that the red coloration was a warning color to predators, but it could also be Batesian mimicry in action. I have never been bitten by one of these, and the assassin bugs we get out here in Utah look almost EXACTLY like box elder bugs (but without any red).
I guess my love for science will be put to the test next year when they come out again… Maybe I’ll see if I can get one to bite me. Or maybe not: so far I have been bitten ZERO times by any bug (that I am aware of) since I launched the site (well, not counting mosquitoes). I am kind of proud of that number.
tceisele said,
November 29, 2007 @ 2:58 pm
Regarding the bite, I was told by a keeper of an “insect zoo” that she had once seen a cicada bite (well, ok, pierce and sip) somebody, even though cicadas are strictly herbivorous. I suspect that any insect that can drill a hole into wood to suck plant juices, will also be able to bore into human flesh pretty well if they put their tiny little minds to it.
Meanwhile, my daughter and I have both been handling assassin bugs pretty carelessly this year, with no bites. Go figure.
David Brady said,
November 29, 2007 @ 4:18 pm
Insect Zoo? I need to hear lots more about this!
Do they have, like, a Hemiptera House and a Lepidoptera House and a Hymenoptera Sandbox? Because, that would be so freaking cool. And I wouldn’t dare set foot anywhere near it….
tceisele said,
November 29, 2007 @ 7:56 pm
There are apparently a bunch of Insect Zoos, mostly associated with museums of natural history. The insect keeper I mentioned was at the one in the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences” [1]. A few others that look pretty good are:
National Museum of Natural History (Smithsonian Institution)
Iowa State University Department of Entomology
Kansas State University Insect Zoo
Houston Museum of Natural Science
I’m sure there are lots of others.
[1] I haven’t actually been there, and in fact I never met the insect keeper in question face-to-face, but she did send me comments on my insect pictures from time to time.
SamWibatt said,
November 29, 2007 @ 9:53 pm
I’ve never been bitten by a box elder bug - I had no idea they bit humans. I count myself lucky, then.
I’ve always liked the little critters. There’s a sort of endearing bumblingness about them.
Kazriko said,
November 30, 2007 @ 1:44 pm
It might be faulty memory though. I’ve been bitten by quite a few bugs while in Paradox, and I recall one day having a whole horde of Boxelder bugs in the yard underneath one of the trees that was there. I was examining them and I thought a couple of them bit me. I haven’t seen that many in one place since then though, and that was the only time I remember being et by them.
Kazriko said,
November 30, 2007 @ 1:46 pm
A site I found said they don’t intentionally bite, but they can puncture the skin…
Insect Picture of the Day » Large Milkweed Bug said,
May 21, 2008 @ 7:02 am
[…] of errors kind of way: he sent me a different image of this bug, which I quickly misidentified as a box elder bug. But Steve said the bug was 45mm long, which is WAY too big for a box elder, so I went back to […]
JFargo said,
May 21, 2008 @ 2:21 pm
When I first saw one of these out back, I actually thought it WAS an Assassin Bug. I’m glad to hear they look similar and that I wasn’t way off in my worry that I was about to get bitten by something that could bring me to my knees.
I was even happier to find, of course, that it was a relatively harmless Box Elder bug when I did some research.