Chris Wirth

As a follow-up to my talk at #ECN2025 — here is a parts list for a budget (~$1,500) focus stacking system: www.ccwirth.com/Z-stacking

Got to maximize the time photographing specimens-so many bugs, so little time!

Harrowing photos of rubber bands that have failed in their archival duty

used rubber bands in the alcohol collection? ONE THOUSAND YEARS DUNGEON

Macro Lens Comparison in the Field As I continue to dive deeper into insect macrophotography, I have been exploring lens options and fallen down many YouTube rabbit holes and read probably hundreds of photography blogs and customer rev...

Thinking about buying a macro lens for insect photography? Along with @ageofarthropods.bsky.social we have been testing many options! Our results are summarized in 2 blog posts in the field www.insectid.org/post/macro-l... and in the lab www.insectid.org/post/lab-tes...

Program cover for the 2025 Entomological Collections Network meeting, feature a beautifully fluffy Pleocoma specimen. Meeting taking place November 8-9, in Portland, Oregon.

Just ONE WEEK until #ECN2025! 🪲

Head to the website to check out the full program:
ecnweb.net/welcome/meet...

This year’s program cover features a beautiful Rain beetle (Pleocoma sp.). Photograph courtesy of @ageofarthropods.bsky.social & the Purdue Entomological Research Collection.

Always is!

And this #TenebTuesday an answer (at last!)—this is the rarely collected Prateus fusculus LeConte, 1862, a member of the subfamily Lagriinae & type genus of the recently-established tribe Prateini (Aalbu et al. 2023)

A reddish-brown beetle specimen with moderately long antennae and two labels reading "Cin. O. / V-28-[?]" and "'Tenebrionidae / unknown' teste Horn"

A mystery teneb for this #TenebTuesday — specimen collected by Charles Dury in Cincinnati &, until last month, was only identified as "'Tenebrionidae unknown' teste [George Henry] Horn" — any guesses?

Six flies minuten-pinned in an uneven row on the edge of a piece of card stock!

Found this cartoonish monstrosity of a specimen preparation while sorting through drawers of unidentified flies in @purdueentcoll.bsky.social !

Focus-stacking photography: Building your own system Ten years ago, Alex Wild published a guide on Scientific American on how to make your own focus-stacking system for under $6000. I can't seem to find that post any more, just some secondary posts with...

Want to set up your own photo-stacking imaging system for under $3000? This post which outlines all the off-the-shelf items I used this year along with some recommendations for how to use it. Planning to talk about this at @entcollnet.bsky.social this November, too! www.insectid.org/post/focus-s...

But this is going to be yet another area where the taxonomists who did all the work to set up the species and the traits to identify them don't get paid. Even as many are retiring or losing their jobs, the resources get diverted away from expertise to the tech sector instead.

A pin bearing several strips of paper with beetles neatly glued to them and text reading “Cin. O. 6-12-[190]4”

The underside of the pin and paper strips showing a patch of gold-colored corrosion

Spotted this “stack” of specimens collected by Charles Dury in 1904 at the Cincinnati Museum Center-upon turning over, I was surprised gold-colored corrosion(?) on the underside

A green and brown beetle with punctate elytra on a white background

And for #TenebTuesday here’s Strongylium crenatum Mäklin, 1867—this species is widespread in the southeastern US, but can separated from the other co-occurring Strongylium by its iridescent green coloration, punctate elytral striae, & indistinct, crenate pronotal margins

A pinned specimen of a grey-brown-and-white-mottled fungus weevil with very long antennae and tufts of setae on its pronotum and elytra

For #WeevilWednesday — a 106-year-old specimen of an anthribid, Toxonotus fascicularis (Schönherr 1833), described by its collector, Willis Blatchley, as "a prettily marked medium sized anthribid frequent on the dead branches" of saffron plum, Sideroxylon celastrinum.

Doyen & Lawrence (1979) note “Edrotes [Pimeliinae: Edrotini] (North America) & Epiphysa [Pimeliinae: Adesmiini] (southern Africa) are strikingly similar in external appearance [but] major differences in endoskeletal features, mouthparts & genitalia refute a close relationship" #TenebrionidTricky

A grey-black round beetle with yellow setae along the junction of its head and pronotum sitting on the ground

Back from an end-of-semester-hiatus here's Epiphysa ciliata Bates, 1872 (Pimeliinae: Adesmiini) for this #TenebTuesday —1 of 9 distinctively globose spp found across arid southern Africa. They are “crepuscular to nocturnal,” retreating to “rocky crevices or mammal burrows” in the day (Penrith 1978)

It is-given the small amount, leave for now-have more pressing specimens to repair!

This specimen has been in @purdueentcoll.bsky.social for nearly 130 years — but has only two minute labels reading "Marquette, Michigan" & "H.G.H." [Henry Guernsey Hubbard] — Hubbard collected extensively in the Lake Superior region in 1876 (Mallis 1971), making this specimens over 149 years old!

A dorsal view of a pinned darkling beetle specimen with black body/appendages, punctate pronotum and striate elytra

A ventral view of a pinned darkling beetle specimen with black and red-tinted body, black appendages, and tufts of golden setae on tarsi

Back from an unintended break — for this #TenebTuesday here's very typical (looking) #tenebrionid — Bouchardandrus concolor (LeConte, 1866), only species in the genus & only known to from the Great Lakes region of Canada (MB ON QC) & US (MI MN OH WI) (Steiner 2016, Bousquet et al. 2018)

Exquisite! An identical model in the Essig Museum is labeled as made by Louis Auzoux around 1850

A brown beetle with ridged elytra and tuberculate pronotum sitting on light orange sand

On this #TenebTuesday an excellent #tenebrionid — a species of Trogloderus (Blaptinae: Amphidorini) — the nine distinctively sculptured species are restricted to sandy areas & dunes in the western United States.

Three blotchily-patterned beetles on flat, white-yellow fungus

From a warm night last fall—several Marbled Fungus Weevils, Euparius marmoreus (Olivier, 1795), at fungus on a fallen tree—these individuals show some of the variation in size & color common in this species!

The setae (hair-like structures) on the elytra are soft! But the specimens are small enough that I’ve only touched with forceps when cleaning or repairing

A dorsal view of double-mounted (pinned) specimen of a beetle with an orange head and pronotum and elytra covered in light/off-grey setae that form patterns

A lateral view of double-mounted (pinned) specimen of a beetle with an orange head and pronotum and elytra covered in light/off-grey setae that form patterns

For this #TenebTuesday a deceptive #tenebrionid — Nilio (Linio) lanatus Germar, 1824 from Bahia, Brazil. Nilio adults & larvae (& sometimes aggregations of either or both stages!) can be found on trunks & branches of trees, where they have been observed feeding on fungus & lichens #Coletopera

Two brown-orange wingless crickets preserved on (glued to) the same point

A pair of myrmecophilus crickets, Myrmecophilus pergandei Bruner, 1884, collected September 6, 1902 in Crawford County, Indiana by W.S. Blatchley—such cool insects! #Orthoptera

A brown, setose beetle nibbling on a dry blade of grass against an sandy orange background

And for this #TenebTuesday here's the distinctively diminutive, setose Eleodes barbata Wickham, 1918 (Blaptinae: Amphidorini)—the species is found in the Four-Corners region of the Colorado Plateau (AZ, CO, NM, & UT)—this beetle was voraciously nibbling on a dry blade of grass!

A view of the head and pronotum of large blue beetle specimen

A top-down view of a large blue beetle specimen with wrinkled elytra

It's #TenebTuesday! This large (>2 cm), intricately sculptured #tenebrionid from Malawi is Catamerus revoili Fairmaire, 1887 (Lagriinae: Pycnocerini)—the 19 Pycnocerini genera are largely found in tropical Africa, w/ 3 in the Philippines, Indonesia, & Malaysia (Schawaller 2003)

An plate illustrating five brown to black tenebrionid beetles (in the genera Salax, Edrotes, Triorophus, and Calyptopsis), with line drawings of head, palp, and antennal details

A green paper cover with text reading "SUITES A BUFFON, PLANCHES, 5 Livraison, INSECTES, COLÉOPTÈRES. PARIS, A LA LIBRAIRIE ENCYCLOPÉDIQUE DE RORET. Rue Hautefeuille, N°12"

For this late night #TenebTuesday here's a hand-colored plate of #tenebrionids from Lacordaire's monumental Genera des Coléoptères—this collection of twelve plates and text explanations was still in their original paper wrappers!

Purdue University’s ‘Time Machine’ - Purdue University College of Agriculture Smith Hall, home of Purdue’s Entomology department, is a small brick building, over a century old, tucked behind much younger trees. But inside a hidden, world-renowned gem-a time machine of sorts, an...

Natural history collections, like the PERC, are the closest thing we have to a time machine! purdueag.exposure.co/perc

Adult & larval forked fungus beetles (family Tenebrionidae) are found on/in shelf fungus across the eastern U.S. & Canada—& despite their appearance they can fly! #TenebTuesday