Roughly 26–31 mm long.
Fine-art photographic collection
Julodis manipularis
A Moroccan jewel beetle whose colour can change from green to violet, copper, gold or almost black within one species.
About this species
Julodis manipularis(Fabricius, 1798)
Information reviewed15 July 2026
Julodis manipularis is a large Moroccan jewel beetle with exceptional individual colour variation and conspicuously hairy elytra. The combination makes each specimen look less like a standard metallic beetle and more like a different mineral.
Taxonomy
Animalia · Arthropoda · Insecta · Coleoptera · Buprestidae · Julodis
Accepted taxon. · checked 2026-07-15
western and central MoroccoBroad range and selected reference localities — not a complete occurrence map.
western and central Morocco
Dry Moroccan scrub, steppe and open woodland from the Atlantic region to the Atlas ranges.
Adults are active in hot sunny conditions on vegetation.
Adults feed on foliage; larvae develop in plant roots or woody tissue as in other Julodis.
Solitary.
What makes this species remarkable?
Individuals from the same species can appear green, blue, violet, copper, gold, brown or nearly black, an extraordinary optical range within one taxon.
Long pale hairs rise from the elytra and soften the reflection, giving the hard metallic surface a brushed or velvet-like texture.
Its structural colours survive long after death because they are produced by the architecture of the cuticle rather than unstable coloured chemicals.