flour beetle

noun

: any of various small darkling beetles (especially Tribolium confusum and T. castaneum) that typically feed on and lay eggs in stored grain and grain products

Examples of flour beetle in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Red and confused flour beetles (so named because they’re often confused for one another) are about 1/8-inch long reddish-brown beetles. —Arricca Elin Sansone, Southern Living, 23 Sep. 2024

But the red flour beetle's rectum is a model of ultra-efficiency in that regard. —Jennifer Ouellette, Ars Technica, 27 Dec. 2023

Red flour beetles in particular are a popular model organism for scientific research on development and functional genomics. —Jennifer Ouellette, Ars Technica, 27 Dec. 2023

Each year, as much as 20 percent of the world's grain stores are contaminated by red flour beetles, grain weevils, Colorado potato beetles, and confused flour beetles, particularly in developing countries. —Jennifer Ouellette, Ars Technica, 27 Dec. 2023

Confused flour beetle by Sarefo (via Wikimedia commons). —Elizabeth Preston, Discover Magazine, 17 Nov. 2015

In species like the flour beetle (Tribolium castaneum), the behavior may also impart a reproductive advantage, since studies have shown that cannibalistic individuals produce more eggs than non-cannibals. —Bill Schutt, Discover Magazine, 3 Jan. 2019

The male flour beetle has to battle other males over the right to mate with a female. —Ed Yong, Discover Magazine, 14 Apr. 2010

The two most promising species are flour beetles and black soldier flies, specifically the larval stages of these animals. —The Economist, 4 July 2019

Word History

First Known Use

1888, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for flour beetle

• fetal
• foetal
• acetyl
• bimetal
• decretal
• varietal
• centripetal

Kids Definition

flour beetle

noun

: any of several usually flattened brown beetles that are pests especially in flour or meal