Field of reeds

I've not had much time for beetling over the last week but did manage to squeeze in a quick trip to the village pond at lunchtime today and grabbed a few more bits of dead standing typha stems to have a poke about in.

I can't quite work out which ones are best and what the beetles actually like. Some stems have quite a few beetles in whilst other seemingly identical nearby ones are entirely devoid of beetle life. Weird.

First up was a new carabid for me the rather lovely Demetrias imperialis.

They are found throughout the south east but the books have them down as scarce. But finding them in the winter in dead reeds appears to be a classic technique.

There were also a number of aleochs of two different species in there, possibly feeding on the large number of thrips that were in several stems. Not quite sure of this one yet. Confusing things, aleochs.

I also got confused (again) looking at the Telmatophilus that were there in some numbers. 

They fall into 3 size categories

The larger ones (on the left) appear to be T. brevicollis and the smallest (right hand beetle) are T. typhae, it's the one in the middle (size wise and in photo above) that I am scratching my head at.

They have the contrasting femora and tibia and a hint of the pronotum being slightly curved before the hind angles. That would make them T. schonherrii which is currently subsumed into T. typhae but is separated in older literature and I am told is probably a valid taxon.

One to definitely ponder and get more experience beetlers to look at my specimens. However, if you told me a year ago that I would be sitting down of an evening with a series of cryptophagids to compare features I probably would have thought you mad.

The post title inspiration is the title track from These New Puritan's third album and features one of the deepest voices I've encountered. Magical stuff.