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- ›Click, Firefly, and Soldier Beetles
Soldier Beetles
Cantharidae
The soldier beetles (Cantharidae) are relatively soft-bodied, straight-sided beetles. They are cosmopolitan in distribution. One of the first described species has a color pattern reminiscent of the red coats of early British soldiers, hence the common name. They are also known commonly as leatherwings because of their soft elytra.
Historically, these beetles were placed in a superfamily "Cantharoidea", which has been subsumed by the superfamily Elateroidea; the name is still sometimes used as a rankless grouping, including the families Cantharidae, Lampyridae, Lycidae, Omethidae (which includes Telegeusidae), Phengodidae, and Rhagophthalmidae.
7 branches of this family, most-observed first
Cantharinae
subfamilyCantharinae
Chauliognathinae
subfamilyChauliognathinae
Silinae
subfamilySilinae
Malthininae
subfamilyMalthininae
Dysmorphocerinae
subfamilyDysmorphocerinae
Ctenophorellus
genusCtenophorellus
Porostenus
genusPorostenus
Where it lives
Recorded sightings
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geo-referenced records in GBIF, from museums, herbaria and field observers.
Drag the globe to turn it. Dots are where records exist, not a range map; darker means more records.
In the stacks
Searching the stacks…
Every page naming Cantharidae in the Biodiversity Heritage Library →
This page is assembled live from iNaturalist, GBIF, Wikipedia, the Source Library and the Internet Archive. It is not yet part of the hand-edited codex. iNaturalist taxon 52932.