[Dave Jones]

Hi there

I wondered if anyone here might recognise an unfamiliar 'bug' that I encountered while away on holiday in West Cornwall, UK, and cannot find any reference to either on the Net or in books. I've included pictures - apologies for the small size and awful quality, they're all I have.
http://www.fireraven.eclipse.co.uk/temp/bug.jpg (sorry image won't seem to embed!)
Left picture is head on, right picture is tail on. The creature is about 1cm long and I saw several examples in two places : the coastpath between Zennor and Gurnards Head and the path up Zennor Hill on 14th May. It is vivid shiny emerald green, apparently wingless, slow moving, 'fat' and lozenge shaped with a segmented look to the body, almost like some kind of larva. Something red protrudes a little from the rear. I seem to recall it had 6 legs.

Anybody know this bug ?

cheers & thanks for any pointers !

Dave

[cjay]

It looks like the larvae of a ground beetle They are small & shiny & usually have a red tip to the tail. They also have six legs.

CJ

[IanF]

How about trying these as possibles :-

1 Hawthorn Shield Bug
2 Rose Chafer
3 Common Green Shield Bug
4 Nezara viridula

I found these in my Collins Garden Wildlife Nature Guide, they may fit the bill. (It is a pocket size book , numerous contents and only costs about £5.)

If you try on Google - images category they all have pictures of the above.

[cjay]

I don't think any of these fit the habitat.

I think what we need is a few people who are able to examine voucher specimans from those species we are not able to identify by photograph. Many are common species but there will alwys be, as in this case one that will stump us all.

CJ

[Dave Jones]

Hi there

Thanks for all the replies. I wish I could have taken a decent photo of it.

None of those mentioned seem to be of the same body structure. Rather than being a flattish backed beetle, it had a very rounded humped cross section (which the photo doesn't show up well), I'm stumped as to anything else to compare it with. I looked at ground beetle larvae, but they are much more elongated while these were short fat and stubby. The head was sort of half hidden under the front of the segments, while the tip of something orange/red peeked out of the rear end. The segmented body was a deep but really vivid emerald green, almost sparkling in the sunlight.
Funny thing is (and I really didn't want to resort to this comparison !) at the time it struck me as bearing a faint resemblance in certain ways to this little chappie: http://www.pangeasoft.net/bug/screenshotpages/sc14.html who is apparently modelled on an american pill bug, but I can't find a real pillbug that fits the description !!

I've gone through the Collins guide to Insects of Britain and Western Europe, (which is quite exhaustive) from cover to cover with no luck at all, nothing looks even remotely similar. Very puzzling.

Thanks again

Dave.