The May guests - Melolontha melolonth

It was a quite boring photo trip with not many things to shoot.
Until I saw something I did not expect.

Ladies and gents...
This is...

Maybeetle (Melolontha melolontha)

I saw him hanging on the wild geranium seed pods. First I saw it was just another snail - from a distance it looked just like something large and brown. And since there is a lot of those around that was my first guess.

Oh yea.. nasty bugger! Let me shoot ya :D





Wait little bugger, wait.. let me go around.





I had no idea what it is. I don't like beetles in general, so only back home google told me what it was. And sure.. I know the name. I even remember how annoying they are when you wanna have a nice warm evening in the garden and they start to fly around hitting everything on their way including your face.
Very annoying!

But I never had the chance to see them from this close.





They are called Maybug as this is the time that it will fly around and (May and June), mate and female will lay eggs in the ground.
The larvae will stay there and grow munching plants roots. They can be a pest in a garden because of that. Fun fact is, that it takes them 3 years of living like a mole to become a grown up beetle.

The bug itself feeds on leaves and is less annoying I guess (unless you don't like beetles like me).

Look at the hooks on the legs :)





Those antennas though are damn impressive!
They fold and open like a fan. I suppose it works like the ones from moths and helps them find a mate catching the pheromones from the air.

Laters bugger...





All that action among those little beauties.