WOOD BORING AND PESTIFEROUS BEETLES

Family Scarabaeidae - Chafers

This is a large family of insects and can be split into two groups, the scavenging dung beetles and the plant eating chafers. The collection includes chafers, also known as cockchafers / maybugs, due to their role as pests.

Chafers are distinguished from the other members of the family Scarabaeidae by the exposed tip of their abdomen. They have a characteristic shape with short powerful legs and are commonly between 3-36 mm in length (Harde 1984).

Adults feed at night on foliage and flowers and in doing so can cause severe damage to plants and trees (Borror et al. 1981). The larvae can be equally if not more destructive. Living in the soil for up to 4 years, they eat the roots of grasses and other plants. This can do considerable damage to pastures, cereals, potatoes and other agricultural crops and means they have considerable economic importance as pests.

Cetonia aurata	Serica brunnea
Melontha melontha	Melontha melontha larvae
Polyphylla fullo male	Polyphylla fullo female
Trichius fasciatus (Bee beetle)