Blunt knapweed flower weevil
The blunt knapweed flower weevil is a small dark brown beetle with a big, round snout. It lives on knapweed flowers. People even use it as a helper to stop knapweed from spreading where it is not wanted.
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Fun facts
The female lays yellow eggs right inside an open knapweed flower.
The larva grows inside the flower for about 17 days. Then it builds a little cocoon out of leftover seeds and rests in it for about nine days.
Males live for about 94 days, but females only for about 58.
In 1991 people brought it to Colorado in the United States to fight knapweed, a weed that spreads very fast.
It looks so much like a close cousin that scientists still wonder if they are really two different kinds.
Most asked questions about Blunt knapweed flower weevil
?What does the knapweed flower weevil eat?
Knapweed. The grown-ups eat the leaves and the larvae eat the seeds inside the flower.
?How big is the knapweed flower weevil?
Small, about 5 to 7 millimetres long.
?Why do people use this weevil?
Because it eats knapweed seeds, it helps stop this weed from spreading in places where it causes trouble.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Larinus obtusus
- Group
- Beetles
- Family
- Curculionidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Coleoptera > Curculionidae
- Lives on
- Europe, Asia, North America
Where the facts come from
- Larinus obtusus (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 Hectonichus. CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this 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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