''Phantazoderus frenatus'' is a species of
longhorn beetle
The longhorn beetles (Cerambycidae), also known as long-horned or longicorns, are a large family of beetles, with over 35,000 species described. Most species are characterized by extremely long antennae, which are often as long as or longer than ...
in the
Cerambycinae subfamily, and the only species in the genus ''Phantazoderus''. The species was
described by
Léon Fairmaire
Léon Marc Herminie Fairmaire (29 June 1820 – 1 April 1906) was a French entomologist.
A specialist in Coleoptera he assembled an immense collection comparable with that of Pierre François Marie Auguste Dejean (1780-1845). This is in the Mus� ...
and
Jean-François Germain in 1864. It is known from
Chile
Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...
and southern
Argentina
Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...
. In flight, ''Phantazoderus frenatus'' is easily confused with species of ''
Pyractomena'', with which it shares coloration. Its rarity may be due to the density relationship with its model, as a remnant of
Batesian mimicry
Batesian mimicry is a form of mimicry where a harmless species has evolved to imitate the warning signals of a harmful species directed at a predator of them both. It is named after the English naturalist Henry Walter Bates, after his work on bu ...
.
References
Bimiini
Monotypic Cerambycidae genera
Taxa described in 1864
{{Cerambycinae-stub