False Mealworm Beetle

Description

Brand new to the website, the False Mealworm Beetle is Alobates pensylvanicus. These are much, much larger than the standard mealworm beetles that develop from pet store mealworms and so don’t let the name fool you. And apparently, they don’t eat meal (whatever meal is). Cornmeal? I don’t think anybody feeds meal to regular mealworm beetles anyway but maybe that was a thing in the 1800’s or something. Of course, we live in the land of milk and high fructose corn syrup now, but I digress.

These beetles are known to be predatory, both as larvae and adults. It seems that they live under bark in nature, or in rotting wood where they feed on soft-bodied organisms.

We keep them with our other tenebs and haven’t noted any predation on tankmates. I suspect that the eggs or larvae of other tenebs might be fodder for them but if you aren’t trying to breed your tenebs anyway, these seem not to harass adult beetles of other species.

They have a flat, rather narrow body, and are medium in size. Their shape generally sets them apart from other tenebs we offer on the site (family tenebrionidae).

$5 each. Limit one per customer, sorry. We do hope to establish better sourcing for these.

You can see photos of these physical characteristics at the link below and we’ll upload photos soon.

More photos and info. at Bugguide.net.