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Chris Reid

Beetling About, painting rare species

Australian Museum entomologist Dr Chris Reid shares a story of painting rare beetles. Many of the world’s rarest species are known to be so rare because their entire populations are easily mapped out. For example, on small islands, where the thing...

Chris Reid

January 2025

Science & Nature

Beetling About in the strange world of Strepsiptera

Strepsiptera parasitise a wide variety of hosts, including silverfish, leaf hoppers, ants, cockroaches, crickets, flies and bees. Just recently the first bee-parasitising type has been discovered in Australia, showing how little we know about these...

Chris Reid

September 2024

Science & Nature

Beetling About with Silverfish

Silverfish. What I know about silverfish – ‘offishially’ called Zygentoma, an order of insects – could be written on the back of a beermat. So let’s find out about them together. Why are they significant? ‘The silverfish’ in Australi...

Chris Reid

August 2024

Science & Nature

Beetling About with ‘Petalura gigantea’

Reviewing my several years of contributions to this esteemed magazine, I realise I’ve been biased towards beetles and moths. The latter usually because I’m late to submit, I’m wondering what to write about, and then fortuitously I see some...

Chris Reid

June 2024

Science & Nature

Beetling About with Weevils

You can read about Zimmie here

Chris Reid

April 2024

Science & Nature

Beetling About: Beetles vs Bugs

The other day I was asked to identify some ‘christmas beetles’ seen at Stanwell Park. There was a photograph – they were brightly coloured and it was Christmas, so why not christmas beetles? This is an example of the insect: Tectocoris...

Chris Reid

February 2024

Science & Nature

Beetling About: With wasps and hornets

The other day the train was late so I sat down to get a twig out of my shoe and got talking to my neighbour on the bench. She discovered I was a bug person (‘bug-a lugs’ when I was a student) and told me she had hornets in the back garden. That...

Chris Reid

January 2024

Science & Nature

Beetling About: Download Christmas Beetle ID app

Just a reminder, in case anyone didn’t know, that this is a particular time of year. Yes, it’s Christmas Beetle season, and there’s a Christmas Beetle survey on, so get out there and record… The photo below shows such a beast. It’s...

Chris Reid

December 2023

Science & Nature

Beetling About in Museums

By Dr Chris Reid of the Australian Museum Today, a little bit of esoterica. What is a museum for? Hopefully, a museum includes education, research, exhibitions and local regional concerns. However, museums are primarily collections, and natural...

Chris Reid

October 2023

Science & Nature

Beetling About: Why you need to know your insect bits

It’s high time we cleaned out our gutters, to get ready for the coming fire season, which might be a bad one. The cockies help, digging out some moss from time to time, but it needs to be done properly. What has this to do with insects? Well...

Chris Reid

August 2023

Science & Nature

Beetling About in Scotland and the Sydney Basin

The Sydney Basin (which includes the Illawarra) is a ‘biodiversity hotspot’ in Australia. This means that it has relatively high diversity of animals and plants, relatively high uniqueness of animals and plants and relatively high level of...

Chris Reid

July 2023

Science & Nature

Beetling About at Helensburgh Railway Station (again)

I begin this story with yet another insect scooped up off the steps of Helensburgh Railway Station, where it was in imminent danger of being flattened. What a great place for insects the station is!

Chris Reid

June 2023

Beetling About

Blitzing the bush

I was pretty naive about Australia. In the UK, I gave a lift to three Australians who told me they had to drive with the windows permanently up in case kangaroos jumped in. It made sense at the time.

Chris Reid

April 2023

Beetling About

Needletails are the original thunderstorm chasers

Today, after the storm, a large flock of needle-tailed swifts zoomed about overhead. Needletails are famous as the original thunderstorm chasers. And as typical swifts they fly huge distances and sleep on the wing, not landing except to nest. Why...

Chris Reid

March 2023