Forest Guardian
| Forest Guardian | ||||||||||||
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Forest Guardian ( Arma custos ) |
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| Systematics | ||||||||||||
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Arma custos | ||||||||||||
| ( Fabricius , 1794) |
The forest guard ( Arma custos ) is a common stink bug (Pentatomidae) that is widespread throughout Europe as far as Siberia . It lives in forests and in clearings on trees, mostly on alders ( alnus ) and bushes.
features
This type of bug, between 10 and 13 millimeters long, strong and somewhat coarse, is comparatively flat and oval in shape. The imago is light to dark brown in color and has numerous irregularly distributed black dot pits on the upper side ( half-ceilings , pronotum, shield and head). The coloring becomes considerably darker in parts in autumn. The connexive is light and dark in color at the front and rear edges of each segment . The pronotum is large with rounded side corners. Seen from above, it appears to be buckled. There are numerous small teeth at the edge in front of the kink. The scutellum is large and extends to the middle of the abdomen. The antennae are red-brown; the third and fourth limbs are ringed dark brown and yellow, the fifth is usually light. The first phalanx of the tarsi is markedly longer than the other two.
The nymphs are significantly lighter than the adults. Their abdomen (the wings are not yet developed) is yellow-brown with a connexive colored as in adult animals and a series of dark spots on the upper side. Your antennae are only fourfold.
Way of life
The bugs of this species predatory feed on insects such as beetles and their larvae. Occasionally they bite other types of bedbugs with their powerful proboscis (rostrum) to suck them out. You can stretch out the rostrum horizontally and carry the prey around freely. They pierce in the area of the thin skin between the segments (intersegmental membrane) because they cannot penetrate the hardened ( chitinized ) parts or the human skin with the thin piercing bristles . The eggs are usually laid in groups on the host plant. It goes through five larval stages, the young often initially stay together in sibling communities. The hibernation of the hemimetabolic animals takes place in the adult stage.
Stages of development
Eggs with young nymphs, as well as several stages of a nymph.
Egg clutches with young nymphs
Nymph 6 days later
Nymph 16 days later
Nymph 28 days later
literature
- E. Wagner: Heteroptera Hemiptera. - In: Brohmer, P., P. Ehrmann & G. Ulmer (eds.): Die Tierwelt Mitteleuropas. IV, 3 (Xa). - Leipzig 1959, 173 pp.
- E. Security guard : Bugs - get to know, watch. Neumann-Neudamm 1989, ISBN 3-7888-0554-4
Web links
- Arma custos at Fauna Europaea