[2] In appearance it is a shining black colour with a purplish tinge and looks very similar to its close relative Scolopterus tetracanthus.

[2] The beetle is present throughout New Zealand and can be discovered by beating native flowering plants in the summer months.

[2] Adult black spined weevils have been collected from Hedychium gardnerianum[3] and caught in the flowers of Helichrysum lanceolatum.

[5] R A Crowson of Glasgow University spent some time in New Zealand in 1956 and 1957 during which period he found larvae associated with pupae and teneral adults under the bark of a dead branch of a Nothopanax.

The larvae were found at Parahaki and Nelson and were later identified by him and Sir G. A. K. Marshall as Scolopterus penicillatus White.