This beetle landed on our drive in SE Melbourne today - I have never seen one of these before so I took a couple of pictures of it.

The photo with the phone is for scale.

Does anyone know what it is?





Thanks

BB

It's December...so it must be a Xmas beetle!

I think that's what they used to call em up in Qld anyway.

http://www.brisbaneinsects.com/brisb...tmasBeetle.htm

I saw those recently in the Australian museum. I think it's a type of scarab... A 'Royal Scarab'?

Something like that anyway.

http://esperancewildlife.blogspot.co...ephala-sp.html

I think Xmas beetles are scarabs too.

They're great big ungainly things that fly around making a noise a bit like a Lancaster bomber...limited navigation skills, often seen and heard banging into solid objects like walls!

PS -that phone is MASSIVE.

Ringo



Nah, it does look like an Xmas Beetle, but I've never seen one that colour. The ones I see are generally the same sort of colour as a cockroach

They are seriously stupid and pointless. Do nothing but thump into things and drop down dead. Stress the cat out as well when she's sitting gazing out of the window and they hit the glass and fall.

The kids at school had some today and were so excited because they are christmas beetles

I was reading about Christmas beetles the other day there are 35 different types; the ones we have our brown but the one you have is one as well. They bombarded the house last year and are doing the same this year, just sweep them all up in the morning from the paths/patios they just all end up on there backs with feet flailing in the air, if you turn them the right way they just do it again

We see the occasional one here, usually just sitting on the lawn. They are often a shiny green colour, sometimes they can be quite spectacular a bit like a hologram.

That's exactly what they are. I'd forgotten about them now we're in an apartment but they're pretty and seem, as MP suggests, completely dumb

Used to scare the bejaysus out of me at the cottage, when they first started up.

I'm informed by our resident entomologist (aged 9) that it's a golden scarab beetle.

Looks like a xmas beetle to me too. Used to have hundreds of them appear at xmas time when I was a kid and we'd have great fun picking them off the fly screens and chasing each other. Used to love it when they arrived because it meant xmas and holidays were around the corner...don't see that many any more but one landed on my deck the other day and made me feel nostalgic.

And she is 100% correct.

The aptly-named golden scarab, found in the Wet Tropics is a Christmas beetle. (Source: Environmental Protection Agency.)

He will be delighted to have that confirmed by the BE information guru.