No Vampire

As a child I knew these beetles as bloodsuckers. A complete misnomer. They visit umbelliferous flowers for pollen and nectar. Their larvae predate slugs and snails.

A more appropriate name is bonking beetle, they are so often encountered mating. To most they are soldier beetles, presumably because of their red coats.

The beetle is on what is now my favourite umbellifer, spreading hedge parsley with its tiny, delicate late-blooming flowers.