Adults are approximately 14–23 mm long.
Fine-art photographic collection
Megalofrea humeralis
A Madagascan longhorn that climbs from eastern rainforest into nearly two-kilometre-high mountain forest.
About this species
Megalofrea humeralis(Vollenhoven, 1869)
Information reviewed15 July 2026
Megalofrea humeralis is a patterned Madagascan longhorn with several historically named colour forms. Records span the humid eastern domain and high Andringitra mountain forest.
Taxonomy
Animalia · Arthropoda · Insecta · Coleoptera · Cerambycidae · Megalofrea
Accepted taxon. · checked 2026-07-15
MadagascarBroad range and selected reference localities — not a complete occurrence map.
Madagascar
Humid eastern forest and central montane forest, including sites near 1,850–1,950 m.
Adults occur on woody vegetation.
Larvae bore in plant stems or wood.
Solitary.
What makes this species remarkable?
Specimens were collected in dense humid mountain forest at Anjavidilava between about 1,850 and 1,950 metres, placing this tropical longhorn at elevations where nights can be cold and vegetation is compressed by wind.
The species has generated multiple named colour varieties — attenuata, distincta, rufonubila and tenuepunctata — because the size and fusion of its pale patches vary dramatically between individuals.
Despite that visual variation, the underlying puncture pattern, antennal proportions and genital characters hold the species together, demonstrating why colour alone can be a dangerous guide to identity.