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Banded longhorn beetle

Typocerus velutinus[4]

The banded longhorn, Typocerus velutinus, is a flower longhorn beetle: adults visit flowers for nectar in fields and other open places, while the larvae feed on decaying oak and hickory wood. Researchers who study it in Indiana describe it as a pollinator.[1][2]

Group
Insect
Order
Coleoptera
Family
Cerambycidae
US records
35 states
Sources
4 cited
Updated
2026-11-09
Banded longhorn beetle on a pink flower, a slender beetle with a rusty body crossed by wide yellow bands and long black antennae
Banded longhorn beetle on a pink flower, a slender beetle with a rusty body crossed by wide yellow bands and long black antennae. Photo: Ken Kneidel, public domain (CC0), via iNaturalist
On this page
  1. Identification
  2. Where it lives
  3. Biology
  4. Damage and signs
  5. Health risk
  6. Control
  7. Related profiles
  8. Common questions
  9. Sources

How to identify it

  • Its color pattern is distinctive: a rusty background with wide yellow bands, and black antennae.[1]
  • It belongs to the flower longhorns, a subfamily of longhorned beetles whose adults typically visit flowers for nectar.[1]

Where it lives

MDC calls it a common species in Missouri, and genetic studies sampled its populations at 17 sites across Indiana.[1][2]

US map: public records from 35 states since 1990 (GBIF).

Biology and life cycle

Adults are found in fields and other open places where flowers are blooming, and also around lights at night.[1]

The larvae feed on decaying oak and hickory wood.[1]

To complete its life cycle it needs open flowering habitat, such as shrubland, grassland or pasture, where adults feed and mate, next to woodland that holds dead and decaying wood for the larvae.[3]

In Indiana, genetic differences between its populations were explained far better by how well suitable habitat connects across the landscape than by distance alone.[2][3]

Damage and signs

  • The larvae feed on decaying oak and hickory wood, and the adults feed at flowers.[1]

Health risk

It is a flower-visiting beetle, and none of these sources describes any risk to people.[1][2]

Control

Prevention

No control is needed. Adults are flower visitors that researchers treat as pollinators, and the larvae develop in decaying wood.[1][2][3]

Common questions

Is the banded longhorn a pest of trees?
MDC says its larvae feed on decaying oak and hickory wood, and researchers describe the species as needing dead and decaying wood for its larvae.[1][3]
Why do I see banded longhorns on flowers?
Adults visit flowers for nectar and feed and mate in open flowering habitat. Researchers study the species as a pollinator.[1][3][2]
Do banded longhorns come to lights?
Yes. MDC notes that adults turn up around lights at night as well as on flowers.[1]

Sources

  1. Missouri Department of Conservation, “Banded Longhorn (Field Guide).” mdc.mo.gov/discover-nature/field-guide/banded-longhorn (accessed 2026-11-09)
  2. Molecular Ecology (Wiley), indexed in PubMed (PMID 27552358), “Abdel Moniem, Schemerhorn, DeWoody and Holland. Landscape genetics of a pollinator longhorn beetle [Typocerus v. velutinus (Olivier)] on a continuous habitat surface. Molecular Ecology 25: 5015-5028 (2016), doi:10.1111/mec.13819 (abstract).” doi.org/10.1111/mec.13819 (accessed 2026-11-09)
  3. Frontiers in Genetics (Frontiers Media), full text in PubMed Central (PMC7136975), “Borthwick et al. Alternative Quantifications of Landscape Complementation to Model Gene Flow in Banded Longhorn Beetles [Typocerus v. velutinus (Olivier)]. Frontiers in Genetics 11: 307 (2020), doi:10.3389/fgene.2020.00307.” doi.org/10.3389/fgene.2020.00307 (accessed 2026-11-09)
  4. iNaturalist, “Typocerus velutinus taxon page (order and family).” www.inaturalist.org/taxa/131862 (accessed 2026-11-09)

Updated 2026-11-09. Built from sourced records. Spot an error? Tell us.