Scarce Four-dot Pin-palp Bembidion quadripustulatum

The Scarce Four-dot Pin-palp, Bembidion quadripustulatum, is a small and locally rare ground beetle belonging to the family Carabidae, and one of a large and taxonomically challenging genus well represented in Britain. Adults are typically dark, with four distinctive pale yellowish spots on the elytra – a pattern that gives the species its descriptive common name – while the ‘pin-palp’ element refers to the characteristically slender, attenuate palps typical of the Bembidion genus. Like many of its relatives, B. quadripustulatum is a riparian specialist, associated with the bare, damp sandy and gravelly substrates of river margins and floodplain habitats that are increasingly threatened by river management, bank stabilisation, and reduced flood dynamics. It is a scarce and declining species in Britain, regarded as an indicator of naturally functioning, dynamic river systems, and a significant record wherever it is encountered. Image: © Udo Schmidt, Flickr.

Find out more: iNaturalist, UK Beetle recording