First blister beetle of the spring. I generally find that these are amongst the earliest beetles I see in spring. They are often amongst leaf litter on the forest floor, as this one was. I think this is a female, as she doesn't have the unusual 'bend' in the antennae that males have. She appeared to be eating this fresh shoot. While most blister beetles feed on vegetation as adults, I didn't think this group, the Meloe, did. But what do I know! The larvae of almost all blister beetles are carnivorous and feed on many garden 'pests'. As adults they eat leaves, though not to the extent that many insects do, and their value as predators on other pest species while in the larval stage far outweighs the damage they may do as adults.