Red Soldier Beetle - Rhagonycha fulva - The common red soldier beetle - Blyddubjöllur - Bloodsucker - Leatherwings - Hermannabjöllur - Roter Weichkäfer - Rotgelber Weichkäfer - Escarabat soldat vermell - Soldadito Rojo - Beetles - Træbuk - Bukkur - Bjöllur - Blómbjöllur - Blyddubjallnaætt - Cantharidae - Ílangar bjöllur - Skordýr - Longhorn beetles - Bonking beetles - Mating pair - Coupling Insects - Bjöllur í mökun - Ástarleikur - Skordýrakynlíf - Kynlíf - Rauðar bjöllur - Female is mated and you get a good look at the mating process and a peek at the male's hooked organs. Bjöllurnar laðast að blómstrandi Hvönn í kartöflugarðinum hjá mér og eru þar á veiðum eftir litlum skordýrum og lirfum. Often seen on umbelifer flowers, such as Hogweed and Cow Parsley. The hogweed flower are made up of many tiny flowers designed to attract the widest possible variety of insects. On sunny days a single hogweed umbel can attract numerous hoverfies, bees, flies and beetles, especially drone flies - Eristalis tenax - and red soldier beetles in flagrante. Stag beetles mating. See more: https://www.youtube.com/redirect.php?w=wttpdEmDyIE I eat many different bad bugs. I really love to live near plantings of goldenrod, milkweed, catnip or hydrangeas. Larvae: We usually have a red head and a dark, flat body. Adults: We look a lot like the larvae Soldier Beetles, but sometimes you might notice that our backs look shiny like leather. See more: https://www3.epa.gov/region1/eco/uep/pdfs/BugBook.pdf The Common Red Soldier Beetle is also known as the 'Bloodsucker' for its striking red appearance, but it is harmless to humans. It has a narrow, rectangular body with longish antennae. There are about 40 species of soldier beetle in the UK, displaying various colour combinations of black, red and orange. The common red soldier beetle will grow up to a centimetre. Nearly all their body is coloured red yellowish. Only the last bit of the elytra is black. The body is flat and elongated. The chitin armour is very soft, resulting in the German name of this species as Weichkäfer (meaning "soft beetle"). The black thread-like antennae are also relatively long. The equally long legs have an orange colour, which become notably darker only at the end. These beetles are active during the daylight hours, when they will hunt mostly for small insects on top of flowers. After copulation the females will lay her eggs. The larvae are soil-dwellers which hunt for snails and insects. After a year and several moults the larvae will pupate and then emerge as fully grown beetles. See more: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_red_soldier_beetle Common Red Soldier Beetles are extremely valuable to gardeners as the larvae predate slugs and snails, a character trait which is highly prized by us organic gardening types. The adults themselves are also predatory of other insects which visit the umbellifers they so often frequent.Indeed I’ve been familiar with them for many years and had rather actually assumed them to be a kind of flower beetle, because they also eat the pollen and drink nectar, so it was particularly satisfying to find out that they also really relish aphids! See more: http://ruralramblings.co.uk/2011/07/common-red-soldier-beetle-rhagonycha-fulva/ They are often seen in large numbers in June and July on flower heads of cow parsley and hogweed. It's quite rare to see them singly. More often they are seen as mating pairs, earning them the nickname of 'bonking beetles'. Their brown, maggot-like larvae live in soil and leaf litter. They feed on springtails and other tiny insects. See more: http://www.uksafari.com/soldierbeetles.htm Filmed with a Panasonic LUMIX TZ40 18.1 Megapixel 20x Optical Zoom.