PROSOPOCOILUS ASTACOIDES BLANCHARDI ( STAG BEETLE ) TAXIDERMY. CLEAR RESIN ENCAPSULATION

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KINGDOM : Animalia

PHYLUM : Arthropoda

CLASS : Insecta

ORDER : Coleoptera Linnaeus, 1758

SUPERFAMILY : Scarabaeoidea Latreille, 1802

FAMILY : Lucanidae Latreille, 1804

GENUS : Prosopocoilus Hope, 1845

STAG BEETLES
A well-known species in much of Europe is Lucanus cervus, referred to in some European countries (including United Kingdom) as "the" stag beetle (it is the largest terrestrial insect in Europe). Pliny the Elder noted that Nigidius called the stag beetle lucanus after the Italian region of Lucania where they were used as amulets. The scientific name of Lucanus cervus is this word, plus cervus, deer. Male stag beetles use their jaws to wrestle each other for favoured mating sites in a manner that parallels the way stags fight over females. Fights may also be over food, such as tree sap and decaying fruits. Despite their often fearsome appearance they are not normally aggressive to humans. Female stag beetles are usually smaller than the males, with smaller mandibles. As larvae, females can be distinguished from males by the presence of cream-coloured, fat ovaries visible through the skin around 2/3 down the larva's back. The larvae feed for several years on rotting deciduous wood, growing through three larval stages until eventually pupating inside a pupal cell constructed from surrounding wood pieces and soil particles. In the final larval stage, "L3", the grubs of larger species, such as Prosopocoilus giraffa, may be the size of a human finger.
A big palate of a male is a main character. This kind of stage beetles are all explanate and suck saps or rotten fruits for food. The Larvae eat fiber structures of rotten woods, so female beetles will search for dead woods or rotten woods to lay eggs. Their body color is golden or dark yellow, and black spots on the outer side of the prothorax are its major feature. They mainly rest in mountains from 200 to 1800 meters of elevations. The adults appear from April to September. It have been observational records in Dongpu, Shalisian forest way, Shenshan in Southern Cross-Island Highway, and Nan an. The adults have phototaxis at night. Profile of Stage Beetles
The mouthparts of stage beetles are made for sucking liquid food. Saps and rotten fruits are their favorites, such as Flame goldrain tree and Orange tree. They are often seen on these kinds of trees.
The adults seldom leave away from trees, no matter eating, matching or copulating and the larvae eat fiber structure of deadwoods for food. So you can easily see them in places with trees or forests.