A soldier beetle on a June afternoon
Pittsburgh, 9 June 2024. I found this one on a warm early-summer afternoon, and it was in no hurry to leave, which is the second thing soldier beetles are famous for. The first is looking like they were painted by someone who loved orange and black and was not afraid of contrast.
This is Chauliognathus marginatus, the margined leatherwing, a soldier beetle of the family Cantharidae (order Coleoptera). The soft, leathery wing covers give the family its other common name, and the dark edging along each wing cover is exactly what the species name means: margined.
Soldier beetles are common on flowers in early summer, feeding on nectar and pollen while also picking off small insects, and they are gentle enough to handle by hand. Their larvae are less charming to the insects they meet: they live in soil and leaf litter, hunting small invertebrates, which makes them quiet allies of any gardener. A yard with soldier beetles is a yard with a free pest patrol. The family name is said to come from the red coats of old soldiers, which the orange wing covers of the European species were thought to resemble, and the name stuck even for the American species with their darker markings.
Once you have held one you see where the family name comes from: the wing covers flex like soft leather instead of hard shell, a texture almost no other beetle can match. It is a small detail, but it is the kind of thing that makes beetle watching feel like a set of tiny discoveries.
