Last night this beetle appeared on the screen door right on time or just a bit late. As I opened the door, it dropped off onto the doormat awaiting its portrait. Lots of beetle species are grouped in the superfamily Melolonthinae and are commonly called "June bugs" and/or "May beetles". This refers to the (uncanny) timing of the adult beetles' emergence after the underground-feeding grubs mature and pupate. It's not clear whether this beetle, which I'm guessing is a European chafer (amphimallon majale) based on gross anatomy and likelihood, is to be expected in May or June, but it's weird how June the first nearly always finds us face-to-snout with one of these species of scarabaeidae.
1 comment:
Enjoyed your site and happy to see another southern CA garden blog.
I used to live in O.C., but now I'm further south, in San Diego County.
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