Creophilus oculatus
In 3 days ~30% in a week ~50%
Creophilus oculatus or devil's coach horse is a species of large carrion-feeding rove beetle endemic to New Zealand. Creophilus oculatus was described and named by Danish zoologist Johann Christian Fabricius as Staphylinus oculatus. The lectotype and two paralectotype specimens were designated by David J. Clarke in 2011 and are housed at The Natural History Museum, London, UK (BMNH). These were some of the first insect specimens collected in New Zealand by Joseph Banks and Daniel Solander in 1769–1770 on Cook's first voyage to New Zealand. The specimens of C. oculatus were likely collected from dried or decaying animal materials which also contained these carrion beetles.
The name "devil's coach horse" is used for Ocypus olens, another large species of rove beetle found in Europe and North America, so named because of a medieval belief that the Devil took this form to carry away the corpses of sinners. The name probably derived from the threatening appearance of O. olens, which is Britain's largest rove beetle species.
At approximately 20 mm in length, Creophilus oculatus is the largest of the over 1000 species of rove beetle found in New Zealand... Wikipedia →
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Egmont National Park | 🇳🇿 New Zealand |
More parks will be added in future updates.
With luck
About 10% of wildlife watchers report a Devil's Coachhorse sighting in Egmont National Park on a given day, based on 6 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 123rd most-seen of the 191 insects we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 30%, and over a week to about 50%, if each day is a fresh chance.
October
In that month about 30% of wildlife watchers report a Devil's Coachhorse in Egmont National Park on a given day, against under 5% in May–September and December–January, the lowest months.
Between 11 am and 2 pm
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Devil's Coachhorse sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
Only Egmont National Park, in our data
Egmont National Park is the only park on Wallace's Line with enough records to rate Devil's Coachhorse sightings: about 10% of wildlife watchers there report one on a given day.
Same order: Coleoptera
The closest relatives of the Devil's Coachhorse that you can see in Egmont National Park (order Coleoptera, Beetles) are Plocamostethus planiusculus (about 20%), New Zealand Striped Longhorn (about 20%) and Steelblue Lady Beetle (about 20%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Devil's Coachhorse is recorded against all the insects logged in Egmont National Park (6 verified sightings from 2019 to 2026), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
