MarkSturtevant wrote:Very good pictures!
That is certainly a reasonable possible ID, but shield bugs, a.k.a. stink bugs, belong to the family Pentatomidae. This critter belongs to the closely related family known as the assassin bugs (family Reduviidae). Pentatomids include predatory species (although not all of them are), and assassin bugs are always predatory. The contrasting bright and dark colors on this one is probably a warning that it is not to be messed with.
As far as I have seen, one can pick up a stink bug without much concern about being defensively pierced by their proboscis. But I would not pick up an assassin bug, not even a small one. They are much more bitey, and wow, do they hurt!
Thanks!
Once I had the right family, Reduvidae, I was able to quickly narrow it down to being Gminatus Australis, using a local Tasmanian insect online guide. As for the warning about assassin bugs, well these ones are apparently very painful if they impale you with their rostrum, something I was unaware of when gently encouraging it to move for a better shot!
Must add, as someone who had Latin thumped into him at school, it's a delight to be able to use it occasionally. Rostrum is of course Latin for a bird's beak or an animals snout, but also the ram of a warship and so gave it's name to the speakers platform in the Forum Romanum, the Rostra (pl), which was adorned with six rams of Latin galleys captured at the battle of Antium in 338BC...and so on to our use of it as a speaker's podium.
So I shall now equate assassin bugs with a mental picture of a trireme smashing through an enemy's hull and take all due care.
