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Rose chafer – Cetonia Aurata

Photographer: Iacopo I. View other galleries in: Nature & Wildlife Share with your friends: Share on FB   Tweet this

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Rose chafer - Cetonia Aurata

In my personal imagery the Maggiolino (May bug) has something related to the mystic. Finding one in grass of my garden was always a great surprise giving a sense of luky. The problem is that Maggiolino is the common name my father teach to me and for this reason it has not been so simple to find some good information about it after shooting these photos… What I always called Maggiolino apparently is something different!

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The Cetonia Aurata (rose chafer) is a beetle fairly common in Europe and America of the subfamily cetoniinae. Looking at it is possible to easily understand the origin of the name. Thanks to its deep green metallic color it seems to be artificial. Its size rarely is more than 0,75 in (1,5 cm) long. It can fly, but as a lot of other beetles it is not really elegant at it. It lives in the vegetation and eat plants, flowers and products of the plants. After mating, the females will lay eggs in about two weeks in shrubs or in the ground overwinter until the following spring.

I remember when I was a child and my parents told some stories about this beetle. In the old times young boys tied a thin rope at a leg of the bug and linked it to a wood stick. This trick let them to have a personal flying jewel to show to their friends.

• Italian: https://www.mvmnt.it/it/galleria_fotografica/foto-natura-animali/285/maggiolino-cetonia-dorata/
• Camera: Canon EOS 20D
• Lens: Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 Macro USM
• Description: The Cetonia Aurata (rose chafer) is a beetle fairly common in Europe and America of the subfamily cetoniinae, it has a metallic green color and is able to fly.