Bug card No. 0470 of 1,500
Eucalyptus tortoise beetle
Paropsis charybdis
The eucalyptus tortoise beetle is a round leaf beetle with pale creamy-white wing cases. Three wide dark bands cross its back. It lives on eucalyptus trees and eats their leaves.
Lives in
Australia, and now also New Zealand, on eucalyptus trees
Can it hurt you?
Harmless
Harmless to people. Foresters do not like it, because it strips eucalyptus trees.
What does it eat?
It eats the leaves of eucalyptus trees. Sometimes so many beetles munch on a tree that it loses lots of its leaves.
How fast is it?
A garden snail about 0.05 km/h (0.03 mph)
A tortoise about 0.3 km/h (0.19 mph)
Eucalyptus tortoise beetle about 0.5 km/h (0.31 mph)
A person walking about 5 km/h (3.1 mph)
cool stuff
Fun facts
1
In New Zealand it is the worst leaf eater of eucalyptus trees.
2
Its belly is yellow-brown, while its back is pale cream with dark bands.
3
People use tiny wasps that lay their eggs in the beetle to keep its numbers down.
you asked
Most asked questions about Eucalyptus tortoise beetle
?What does the eucalyptus tortoise beetle eat?
Eucalyptus leaves. It is a big pest of eucalyptus trees in New Zealand.
?Where does the eucalyptus tortoise beetle live?
It comes from Australia and has spread to New Zealand.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Paropsis charybdis
- Group
- Beetles
- Family
- Chrysomelidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Coleoptera > Chrysomelidae
- Lives on
- Australia and Oceania
Where the facts come from
- Paropsis charybdis (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by Uwe Schneehagen. CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons. The round sticker of this bug is cut from the same picture.
If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.
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