Description: A colourful 6-7mm long yellow ground beetle with prominent black cross marking on the wing cases.

NI account: Early records are for Muckross, Killarney (Bullock, 1914) and the Clare shore of Lough Derg (MacKechnie Jarvis, 1971). Very local and difficult to find. Modern records: Derrybeg West and Derrymacrow, Crom, Fermanagh (Keith Alexander & Andrew Foster, 1992); Doonweelin L., Sligo and Garron, Roscommon (Martin Cawley, 2003, 2009); Glengarriff Forest, Cork (Myles Nolan, 2004); Teiges Mountain, Tyrone (Dave Allen, Clive Mellon, 2009). In Britain, it is restricted to a few sites in the extreme south of England.

Ecology: Parasitic on the leaf beetle Galeruca tanaceti (L.), usually in areas where the food plant Succisa pratensis is dominant. Can be taken by sweeping Succisa heathlands at dusk, but is more regularly encountered by field workers counting marsh fritillary webs.

Distribution: A Eurasian Wide-temperate species (65), widespread in Europe south to north Africa and Asia Minor, and eastwards to Siberia and Japan.

Similar Species: Colour and form characteristic

Key Identification Features:

• Medium (6-7mm), brightly coloured
• Elytra truncate or sinuate at apex (Fig. 97)
• Elytra broad and expanding apically
• Pronotum sinuate at base
• Neck strongly constricted
• Pronotum red, elytra reddish-yellow with a black 'cross' marking

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

iNaturalist: Lebia cruxminor at iNaturalist World Species Observations database.

GBIF data for Lebia cruxminor | Classification: Insecta, Coleoptera, Carabidae, Lebia

Thumbnails for genus Lebia