Mrs O and I went to the Netherlands last week to visit some of her relatives. We stayed in a campsite in some woods to the east of Zwolle in Overijssel. My sister-in-law was complaining about May bugs or Maikäfer which were visible in large numbers flying above the grass.

Although I had heard of them in both the UK and Gemany I do not recall seeing them. The young ones such as that above was a bit over a centimetre long with brown wingcases and a greenish head and shoulder. Having returned to the UK I realise that they are also called cockchafers here.

They fly around noisily and seemed to get everywhere including the picnic table (above). They seem to have a fascinating life cycle of three years with two of those spent underground as grubs. They have been regarded as a pestilence at times due to their ability to eat green leaves - and hence crops.

The fully grown ones were a good 3 cm in size like this one crawling slowly across a tile. However once they reach this size they did not seem to last very long. There were a good deal of dead ones lying around. Interestingly you can tell the sex by the number of 'leaves' in the antenna - I counted six on this one so it is presumably a female.