Sex-crazed Bonking Beetles have invaded
Whew. Meet the Hogweed Bonking Beetles. Viagra has nothing on these guys.
The bugs shown in the photo earned their colourful name in the U.K., after the down-to-earth Brits noticed that they never seem to stop . . . er . . . bonking.
It’s no exaggeration, either. These sex-crazed critters have invaded my garden this summer, and their energy in the copulating department is truly phenomenal. In fact, you rarely see them alone. They’re almost always in pairs, one on top of the other, busily making sure that there’ll be lots of bonking babies coming along to perpetuate the species.
Over here, we’re predictably more restrained with our terminology — one Canadian website uses the coy term “in copula” in reference to the bugs’ vigorous mating habits — and we normally call them soldier beetles. But whatever the moniker, the Rhagonycha fulva (to use its Latin name) comes in several guises and is considered a useful little fellow to have around. That’s because, when not preoccupied with doing what comes naturally, it gobbles up aphids and other unwanted garden interlopers.
My bonking beetles are brilliant orange, but a red version is equally common. And they’re quite particular about where they spend their turbocharged lives. Plants collectively known as Umbelliferae are a fave — certainly true in my garden, where dozens of them are currently congregating happily on the broad lacy flower heads of mature dill plants and Queen Anne’s Lace.
Giant Hogweed, which the beetles love, too (and gave rise to their name), is also a member of the Umbelliferae family, and far more tolerated in the U.K. than in Canada. (Although we go into conniptions about this rash-causing plant, demanding that it be immediately destroyed the moment a stalk appears anywhere, I’ve seen it growing in many locations in the British countryside.)
Yet my new garden visitors also seem partial to the prickly thistle heads of Eryngium, or sea holly — a predilection which clearly annoys the honeybees from my neighbour’s hives, with whom they keep jostling for space.
I’m truthfully a bit irked myself, because I confess to finding sea holly a supremely irritating plant. Its subdued blue-green colours may be trendy with hoity horts, but the stalks flop everywhere, and most of the time, they don’t even look as esthetically appealing as a clump of common purple thistles in a farmer’s field.
Yet therein lies a common dilemma for modern gardeners: which comes first — beauty or the bees?
The bees truly love my sea holly — they crawl all over it every year, getting at the pollen. And now that the soldier beetles have become ardent fans, too, I guess it’s staying, ugly or not.
Besides, all that bonking is, I admit, making for some entertaining moments in the garden this soggy summer — on the rare occasions when the rain stops and the sun comes out. soniaday.com