Wing Mau Beetles - the COMPLETE collection

I was going to make this a Blogpost, but I think it's a bit overwhelming for the Blog (at least all at once), so I decided to make it a forum post.

Today we are looking at an overview of the entire set of Beetles made by Wing Mau. I wanted a concise review for all the figures in the set to serve as a single-point reference for collectors. Related taxa will be imaged together, with a short note on geographic distribution. For many years I had 13 of the figures, and in just the last couple weeks miraculously completed this Holy Grail set with help and guidance from STS forum member NMR_Okapi!

First of all, yes, these figures are made by Wing Mau. For years, myself and others on the forums mistakenly thought the manufacturer was called 'XX" because the Wing Mau logo of a 'W' on top of an 'M' gave the impression of consecutive X's. I am not sure when the set came out, but it was probably in the mid-late 1990s alongside sets by Play Visions, K&M International, and Club Earth. Each figure is marked on the underside with the Latin name of the species (so there is no doubt to the intended species) and the Wing Mau logo.

The first pic below is a Beetles poster that is known to every entomologist who studies beetles. Every coleopterist and insect museum in the country probably has this poster hanging on its walls. It has become a staple among beetle enthusiasts. I am certain that this poster was the inspiration for these figures, as all 24 species happen to be on this poster and they are all marked with the same Latin names. The poster has a copyright of 1992, printed in Italy. The poster, as shown below, today hangs on my bedroom wall above my computer. It was a gift from a grad student in 1995, when I was an undergrad at the University of Arizona. She gave it to me for watching over her live insect cultures when she was on a collecting trip that summer (sorry for the glare; the poster is laminated).

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Now onto the figures. I have made an attempt to image related taxa together. Nearly every species here is unique in toy/figure form.

Family Carabidae (ground beetles), from left to right:
1. green tiger beetle, Cicindela campestris. Europe
2. fiery searcher, Calosoma scrutator. North America

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Family Histeridae (clown beetles)
1. Hister quadrimaculatus. Europe

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Family Lucanidae (stag beetles), from left ro right:
1. Darwin's beetle, Chiasognathus granti. Argentina, Chile
2. Mesotopus tarandus. Sub-Saharan Africa
3. rainbow stag beetle, Phalacrognathus muelleri. Australia, New Guinea

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Family Scarabaeidae (scarab beetles), from left to right, top to bottom:
1. Aphodius fimetarius. Palearctic, introduced to North America, Australia
2. green June beetle, Cotinis nitida. Eastern North America.
3. Dicranorhina berbyana. Sub-Saharan Africa
4. Jumnos ruckeri. Thailand

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Series Elateriformia, families Buprestidae (metallic wood-boring beetles), Lampyridae (fireflies), and Cantharidae (soldier beetles), from left to right:
1. Anthaxia nitidula. Europe
2. Photinus pyralis. Eastern North America
3. Podabrus tomentosus. Eastern North America
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Family Coccinellidae (lady beetles), from left to right:
1. two-spotted lady beetle, Adalia bipunctata (typical form). Holarctic
2. two-spotted lady beetle, Adalia bipunctata (dark morph). Holarctic
Note: even though there are two color morphs of this species, they made original sculpts for each, and did not just paint the same sculpt two different colors!
3. nine-spotted lady beetle, Coccinella novemnotata. North America (being displaced by introduced C. septempunctata and Harmonia axyridis)

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Superfamily Tenebrionoidea (darkling beetles, and allies), from left to right:
1. ironclad beetle, Zopherus nodulosus haldemanni (marked Zopherus haldemanni). Texas, northern Mexico.
2. cardinal beetle, Pyrochroa coccinea. Europe

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Family Chrysomelidae (leaf beetles), from left to right:
1. green tortoise beetle, Cassida viridis. Europe, North Africa, introduced to Canada
2. dogbane beetle, Chrysochus auratus. North America
3. Colorado potato beetle, Leptinotarsa decimlineata. North America, introduced to Europe

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Family Cerambycidae (long-horned beetles), from left to right:
1. musk beetle, Aromia moschata. Palearctic
2. Phosphorus virescens jansoni (marked Phosphorus jansoni). Africa
3. spotted longhorn, Rutpela maculata (marked Strangalia maculata). Europe

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What a very special catch for you :)

WOW !!!!

Glad I could help complete your collection, they look great!!

Holy cow! Thats a great little collection of the most diverse group on the planet. Big congrats and thanks for showing them all!

Congratulations Blaine, and big thanks to NMR_Okapi! That's an awesome set. Wing Mau produced/produces some great things, it's too bad they're not more obtainable.

I am glad you decided to open this topic. Topics about sets that are not easy to group are always very important and useful. They always serve as a good source to other collectors. I enjoy particularly the last group.

As Blaine pointed in another thread, this set can be found in the 1998 Play Visions catalogue and I am sharing the page scan here.
Nobody found one of these figures marked PV or any set branded Wing Mau, so I am moving this topic to the Play Visions section.

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It’s about time we put photos of the rest of these beetles into the wiki.

I would provide the photos of the one beetle in this series that I do have, the Colorado beetle.[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

Very useful [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.], especially important that you share a picture where we can see how it is marked. Your potato is now on TAW but now we need to open two pages for different leaf beetle species. As I told you several times. All this editing requires effort and time. It is not magic and we are not Harry Potters.
Have you gotten it in a random lot?

Yes. It was in a lot with the following figures:
Safari MBA Orca
Safari Sea Turtle, old version
Safari Exotic Birds and Frogs and Turtles TOOBs
K&M AZA Hawaiian Monk Seal
K&M Jungle Tube Crocodile and Bongo
Play Visions generic transparent fish
Various Innovative Kids and Marvel sea animals
Various unbranded small savanna and jungle animals

Good catch

Birdsage wrote:

Yes. It was in a lot with the following figures:
Safari MBA Orca
Safari Sea Turtle, old version
Safari Exotic Birds and Frogs and Turtles TOOBs
K&M AZA Hawaiian Monk Seal
K&M Jungle Tube Crocodile and Bongo
Play Visions generic transparent fish
Various Innovative Kids and Marvel sea animals
Various unbranded small savanna and jungle animals

Very complete answer. So it arrived with lots of other USA toys.

bmathison1972 wrote:

Family Coccinellidae (lady beetles), from left to right:
1. two-spotted lady beetle, Adalia bipunctata (typical form). Holarctic
2. two-spotted lady beetle, Adalia bipunctata (dark morph). Holarctic
Note: even though there are two color morphs of this species, they made original sculpts for each, and did not just paint the same sculpt two different colors!
3. nine-spotted lady beetle, Coccinella novemnotata. North America (being displaced by introduced C. septempunctata and Harmonia axyridis)

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I was trying to find out why two different moulds were marked with the same species name and fortunately I rediscovered this topic. Wikipedia describes those morphs of the two-spotted ladybug but does not illustrate. It is not usual for a brand to use different moulds for color morphs. but actually it is a nice detail. I was adding on TAW pictures from Beatrice's collection and it looks like B1 mold has a different variation which may represent a known melanistic morphwhich might interest you. We also still miss a few pictures on TAW, not many, it would be great if you could provide pictures of the missing ones. I can list them if you wish.
Here are the two variations of the B1 mold.

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I was fortunate to come across many Wing Mau beetles recently. The beetles in the set seem to have less realistic/detailed paint jobs compared with the beetles already posted, however many are in colors that I don't see in this thread. I believe the beetles I have were old store inventory, possibly sold in something like those loose bins of toys sold near the cash register for 25 cents a piece. Just a guess. I'm also assuming this set is from the early 2000s based off of the other toys they were sold with. For the sake of documentation, here is complete set:

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Interestingly there seems to be two patterns for on the Colorado potato beetle - one pattern that's already been posted here and one that hasn't:

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Very cool

Impressive team Welcome on STS snailtime

Will you show us your collection one day ?