Dear Bugman,
I live in a small town called Milton on the south coast of NSW Australia and today which is a nice summer day, not hot or to windy, just a nice breeze.After a busy morning my children were relaxing watching TV in our lounge room when this bug fell down the chimney. I have lived in the area all my life and have never seen anything like this before. It can fly but is not at all graceful, quite heavy in fact like it does not fly often. I am sure you can solve the mystery as your website and resources of information is incredible. Thank you,
Kelly.
Hi Kelly,
This is actually an easy ID for us. The first time we tried to identify the Australian Fiddler Beetle, Eupoecila australasiae, we had to spend a bit of time on the internet. We selected it as our Bug of the Month in February 2007. It is one of the colorful Scarab Beetles that appear around Christmastime in Australia.