bark beetle series

Beetles are a group of insects that form the order Coleoptera, a name derived from the Greek words “koleos”, meaning sheath and “ptera” meaning wings. This name references the modified front wings that serve as a protective cover for the membranous hind wings. Within Coleoptera, which is the largest of all orders and constitutes almost 40% or all described insects, is the family Curculionidae, the largest of all the families in this order with roughly 83,000 members. Bark beetles are members of this family and earned their name through their habit of mining, living, and reproducing between the bark of trees and the rest of the wood. There are three genera of bark beetles highlighted in this series: Dendroctonus, Scolytus, and Ips. Each of these three genera produce distinctive galleries depending on their species and those differences are the focus of this hand-pressed linocut series.