lined longhorn beetle

Lined longhorn beetle is a slender, tapered, small to moderate-sized, flower longhorn beetle. It is common to abundant in most of its range from Maine to Minnesota, adjacent Canadian provinces, and south along the Appalachian Mountains to Georgia. It is less common in Minnesota, where it is at the western edge of its range.

Adults are 5 ⁄16″ to ½″ long. Males are slightly smaller and more slender than females.

The head is angled forward in front and is abruptly constricted in back forming a neck that is visible when viewed from above. It is mostly black except for the yellow mouth parts. The compound eyes are black, moderate-sized, and deeply notched. The antennae are slender, banded yellow and black, and long, about as long as the body. The base of each antenna is inserted in the notch in the compound eye. The third segment is longer than the first and the fifth segment is longer than the third.

The upper thoracic shield (pronotum) is bell-shaped, arched, narrow at the front, as wide at the base as the base of the hardened wing covers (elytra), and as long as the base is wide. It is slightly inflated (arched) on top (dorsally). It has a shallow impression in the middle near the base. The angles at the rear (posterior) corners of the pronotum are very sharp and point outward. It is densely covered with fine pits. It is also covered with short, fine, gold hairs, sparsely on top (dorsally), densely on the lowers sides.

The hardened wing covers (elytra) are long and narrow, more than 2½ times longer than wide. They taper evenly from the broad base to the narrow tip, making the body appear broad-shouldered. They are yellow with a variable amount of black marks. There is always a narrow black stripe along the inner margin (sutural stripe), a dark stripe in the middle (median stripe), and a broad stripe along the outer margin (lateral stripe). The tips are always black. There is often a darkened spot in the shoulder (humeral) area; sometimes a black, triangular spot near the middle connecting the median and lateral stripes; and sometimes a black spot near the tip merging with the median and lateral stripes. The elytral surface is pitted, finely and sparsely near the base and at the tip, coarsely in the middle. It is also moderately covered with short hairs.

The legs are slender, yellow, and densely covered with fine hairs. The fourth segment (tibia) has a spur at the tip and on males is arced. The last part of each leg (tarsus), corresponding to the foot, is black. It has five segments but the fourth segment is minute and is concealed within the lobes of the heart-shaped third segment, making it appear that there are only four segments. On the hind leg, the tarsi are slender. The first segment is as long as all of the remaining segments together. The third segment is split beyond the middle.

Total length: ¼″ to ½″

May to August

Adults are active during the day.

Dead moist wood of hardwoods, including birch, blue beech, ironwood, and also pine

Nectar of a wide variety of flowers including grape; raspberry and blackberry; elderberry; meadowsweet; rose; cherry and plum; dogwood; knotweed; leadplant and false indigo; and false Solomon’s seal.

Sources

24, 27, 29, 30, 82, 83.

Common to abundant

Superfamily
A mitochondrial DNA and phylogenetic analysis of Cerambycidae and related families in the superfamily Chrysomeloidea was published in 2020. It showed that Cerambycidae evolved before Chrysomeloidea, and therefore should be placed in its own superfamily Cerambycoidea. However, there is no evidence that the resulting family would be composed of a common ancestor and all of its lineal descendants (monophyletic). For that reason the move has not been widely accepted. iNaturalist accepted the move. ITIS, NCBI, and BugGuide did not.

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