Minotaur beetle
Typhaeus typhoeus
Name means: “named after Typhon, a giant from the old Greek stories”
The minotaur beetle is a stout, shiny black beetle shaped like a dome. The male has three horns sticking forward from his back: two long ones and a short one in the middle. It is a dung beetle that digs deep into the ground.
Lives in
Parts of Europe and North Africa, in sandy heaths and sunny pine woods
Length
1.5 to 2.4 cm (0.59 to 0.94 in)
Can it hurt you?
Harmless
Harmless. Its horns look fierce, but it does not hurt people.
What does it eat?
Like other earth-boring dung beetles, it feeds on animal droppings.
How big is it?
How long is it?
🍚as long as 4 grains of rice in a row🍽️could run across a dinner table in 5.7 seconds
How big is Minotaur beetle compared to YOU?
Just maths in your browser. Nothing is saved or sent anywhere.
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)
Minotaur beetle about 0.63 km/h (0.39 mph)
A person walking about 5 km/h (3.1 mph)
cool stuff
Fun facts
1
Only the males have the long horns. Females just have a few small bumps.
2
Its legs are covered with lots of little spines that help it dig.
3
In Germany it is a specially protected beetle.
you asked
Most asked questions about Minotaur beetle
?Is the minotaur beetle dangerous?
No. Its horns look scary, but it is harmless to people.
?How big is the minotaur beetle?
About 1.5 to 2.4 centimetres long.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Typhaeus typhoeus
- Group
- Beetles
- Family
- Geotrupidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Coleoptera > Geotrupidae
- Lives on
- Europe, Africa
Where the facts come from
- Typhaeus typhoeus (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 unknown author. CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
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