Rhagium bifasciatum Fabricius, 1775

This is one of most common European members of the family, it occurs throughout southern and central Europe north to the UK and the south of Fennoscandia but is absent from some areas of the northeast and some of the Mediterranean islands, to the east it extends through the Caucasus and Asia Minor into western Russia. Here it is locally common to the far north of Scotland including Anglesey and the Inner Hebrides but is absent from Man, it is also widespread in the north and east of Ireland. The typical habitat is damp deciduous, coniferous or mixed woodland with plenty of timber in various stages of decay although populations may also occur in isolated trees or fallen timber on moorland etc. Adults occur from April until June or July and will often be found in numbers, especially in early spring when they are just beginning to emerge from their overwintering sites under bark, they fly well and visit a range of flowers to feed on pollen, especially those of elder, hawthorn and various umbels, and they are also known to feed on pine needles. Mating and oviposition occurs in the spring and a wide range of both broadleaf and coniferous trees have been recorded as hosts e.g. pine, spruce, larch, fir, chestnut, oak, birch, beech. Ash, hornbeam, alder, poplar, hazel, hawthorn and hazel etc., mating pairs may be observed during the day on bark or flowers and females lay eggs in batches among damp bark on stumps, and fallen and standing trunks. Young larvae bore galleries beneath bark but as they grow they penetrate the xylem, producing long meandering tunnels loosely packed with wood dust and frass, they usually develop over two years but this may be extended to four or five years depending upon the temperature and humidity. Pupation occurs in late summer or autumn in a cell beneath the bark or, if the wood is very soft, within a cell constructed parallel to the grain deeper in the xylem, adults eclose during September or October and are soon fully formed but they remain in the pupal cell until the following spring when they will emerge en masse.