Adults are red just after pupation and soon thereafter become blackish. They move rapidly across comb and are difficult to pick up. The larvae are elongate, whitish grubs with rows of small spines along the back. Larvae look superficially like wax moth larvae, but the legs of beetle larvae are larger, more pronounced, and restricted to near the head. Beetle larvae do not spin webs or cocoons in the bee hive but rather pupate in the soil outside the hive.
Pupae are whitish brown.
The small hive beetle is native to southern Africa where it requires 38-81 days to develop from egg to adult, and five generations per year are possible. The first record of this beetle in the western hemisphere was determined from a commercial apiary in Florida in May 1998. Beetle specimens were found from bee hives near Atlanta, Georgia in June 1998 and confirmed as A. tumida on July 13, 1998. In Africa the small hive beetle behaves as a scavenger of weakened colonies much like the greater wax moth, and it is relegated to secondary pest status. But that has not been the experience of Florida beekeepers in whose apiaries the beetles have caused considerable damage and colony loss.