{"id":6094,"date":"2009-01-20T00:00:52","date_gmt":"2009-01-20T06:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/field-station\/?p=6094"},"modified":"2017-06-19T20:12:47","modified_gmt":"2017-06-20T01:12:47","slug":"masked-hunter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/field-station\/bug-of-the-week\/masked-hunter\/","title":{"rendered":"Masked Hunter (Family Reduviidae)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Salutations, BugFans,<\/p>\n

Occasionally, one of the BugLady\u2019s wee dust bunnies becomes a little more animated than the rest of them—a situation that is startling, momentarily, until she remembers the Masked Hunter (Reduvius personatus<\/em>), an alien from Europe and Africa that is now found throughout the U.S. The adult is a striking, shiny, black bug about 3\/4\u201d long. The immature (nymph<\/em>) has a sticky \u201cfinish\u201d that attracts lint and dust; in short, stuff sticks to Junior, earning it the nickname \u201cdustbug,\u201d and camouflaging or \u201cmasking\u201d it from its predators. One correspondent on www.whatsthatbug.com<\/a> submitted a photo of a blue immature that was found in a blue shag carpet; another referred to them as having a \u201ctempura-like\u201d coating.<\/p>\n

Masked Hunters<\/h3>\n

Masked Hunters, in the order Hemiptera (True Bugs), are in the family Reduvidae, Assassin bugs, a group of active and ambitious hunters that stalk primarily insect prey and will go after critters that may be larger than they are. They dispatch their prey by stabbing it with their short beak (rostrum<\/em>) and injecting it with potent chemicals that both paralyze their catch and soften its innards so they may be slurped out.<\/p>\n

\"masked-hunter-1\"<\/a><\/p>\n

A sub-family of Assassin bugs (but not the Masked Hunter\u2019s group) includes bugs called \u201cKissing Bugs\u201d—the ultimate in image ambiguity. They feed on the blood of mammals, including humans, and a few are notorious disease vectors; their nickname derives from their targeting the thin skin on their victim\u2019s face, especially the lips, often while said victim is asleep. The debilitating and potentially fatal Chagas disease of Central and South America is spread by these Kissing bugs, which bear a family resemblance to the Masked Hunter.<\/p>\n

The good news is that Masked Hunters are insect-feeders, untiring consumers of bedbugs, a pest that is staging a comeback in big cities everywhere thanks to the ease of world travel. The bad news is that they are untiring and, according to some references, nearly exclusive consumers of bedbugs, and these authors suggest that if you have the predator, perhaps you should check for the prey! (Masked Hunters also live in nest colonies of Swallows, dining on small bedbug-relatives called \u201cSwallow bugs\u201d). The BugLady sees Masked Hunters on early summer nights on her front porch, to which they and hundreds of other insects have been attracted by the light, and has read that sowbugs, lacewings, flies, carpet and grain beetles, and earwigs show up on their dinner plates, too.<\/p>\n

\"masked-hunter-2\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Handle With Care!<\/h4>\n

Masked Hunters and their relatives are not aggressive toward humans (and most do not spread disease), but they can defend themselves effectively if manhandled. The same beak that is so lethal to their prey can deliver a poke that is described by Eaton and Kaufman in their Field Guide to Insects of North America<\/em> as \u201cexcruciating\u201d and by other references as \u201clike a snakebite,\u201d \u201cpainful enough to cause immediate faintness and vomiting\u201d and as resulting in longer-term swelling, blood blisters and irritation. The \u201cKissing Bug Scare of 1899\u201d (True story! Google it!) was apparently caused when these guys (or their relatives the Black Corsairs, sources disagree) experienced a population boom in the northeast, entered houses in large numbers, and inflicted bites as people brushed them away from their faces.<\/p>\n

When they\u2019re not feeding, assassin bugs bend their heads slightly downward, resting the beak\/rostrum in a short, ridged grove between their forelegs. They can produce sound by rubbing the beak-tip across these ridges. More Stridulation.<\/p>\n

 
\nThe BugLady<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The adult Masked Hunter<\/strong> is a striking, shiny, black bug about 3\/4\u201d long. The immature (nymph) has a sticky \u201cfinish\u201d that attracts lint and dust; in short, stuff sticks to Junior, earning it the nickname \u201cdustbug.\u201d MHs are insect-feeders, untiring consumers of bedbugs, a pest that is staging a comeback in big cities everywhere thanks to the ease of world travel. If you have the predator, perhaps you should check for the prey.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3666,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","uwm_wg_additional_authors":[]},"categories":[8],"tags":[154],"class_list":["post-6094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bug-of-the-week","tag-true-bugs"],"yoast_head":"\nField Station<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/field-station\/bug-of-the-week\/masked-hunter\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Masked Hunter (Family Reduviidae)\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The adult Masked Hunter is a striking, shiny, black bug about 3\/4\u201d long. 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