Description: 11-13mm long dull coppery-green predatory ground beetle living in damp meadows and lakeshores. Widespread but local, rarer in the north.

NI account: Currently very much a southern species both in Britain (Luff, 1998) and in Ireland. Johnson & Halbert (1902) were of the opinion that it was common throughout Ireland, but we think this was mistaken and based on limited experience of a relatively small number of suitable localities. There is evidence that it has decreased in recent decades in the midlands and north of England, but it was seemingly always rare in Northern Ireland with definite historical records only for Johnson's former parish of Armagh, and for Acton Glebe, Armagh, where he also lived for a time. There is only a single modern record for this area which relates to the shores of Lough Neagh near Antrim. Much less rare in midland and southern counties.

Ecology: This is a moderately thermophilic species which in central Europe is common on arable land. In Ireland it is mostly reported from open, bare ground on limestone rocks or similar warm substrata. There appear to be no published records for agricultural land here.

Distribution: A Eurasian Wide-temperate species (65) found over the whole of Europe to eastern Siberia.

Similar Species: Pterostichus versicolor: head almost impunctate; outer pronotal fovea half way between margin and inner fovea

Key Identification Features:

• Large, black with strong metallic reflections
• Three basal antennal segments with a keel (Fig. 59)
• Head finely punctate
• Outer pronotal fovea closer to side margin than to inner fovea

Distribution Map from NBN: Poecilus cupreus at National Biodiversity Network mapping facility, data for UK.

iNaturalist: Poecilus cupreus at iNaturalist World Species Observations database.

GBIF data for Poecilus cupreus | Classification: Insecta, Coleoptera, Carabidae, Poecilus

Thumbnails for genus Poecilus