Coastal-distribution
Guides
Eleodes gigantea
desert stink beetle, darkling beetle
Eleodes gigantea is a large darkling beetle in the family Tenebrionidae, commonly known as the desert stink beetle. It is distributed along the Pacific coast of North America from central California to Baja California, Mexico. When threatened, it exhibits the characteristic defensive behavior of the genus Eleodes: raising its body and secreting benzoquinone compounds from abdominal glands. The subspecies E. gigantea meridionalis has been documented in Pleistocene deposits at the La Brea Tar Pits.
Erynephala maritima
Erynephala maritima is a species of skeletonizing leaf beetle in the family Chrysomelidae. The species has been recorded from coastal and near-coastal regions across a broad geographic range spanning the Caribbean Sea, Central America, and North America. Specific locality records include Nova Scotia, Texas, Mexico, and Jamaica. As a member of the genus Erynephala, it belongs to a group of leaf beetles characterized by their skeletonizing feeding damage on host plants.
Pheidole obscurithorax
Large Imported Big-headed Ant
Pheidole obscurithorax is a large, dark, dimorphic ant native to northern Argentina and Paraguay. It was introduced to Mobile, Alabama in the early 1950s and has since spread along an 80-km-wide coastal band between Alabama and Tallahassee, Florida. The species is characterized by worker dimorphism with enlarged-headed majors and has demonstrated rapid population growth in invaded areas, with nest density increasing 6.4-fold over two years in Tallahassee. It coexists with the red imported fire ant (Solenopsis invicta) and appears to have minimal negative impact on native ant communities, being part of a largely exotic ant assemblage adapted to disturbed habitats.