Protaetia Alboguttata Beetles Spotted in Gurugram

The rainy season brings with it many surprises, some exciting and some, well not so, especially when it comes to getting drenched. While last year the rains brought in hordes of bees of all kinds, this year it was a number of greenish-blue metallic beetles with white/cream coloured spots on their bodies. After doing some research I came to understand that these beetles might be the Protaetia Niveoguttata beetles but then later was informed by Dr. Saraswat a well known Scientist that these were more likely Protaetia Alboguttata Beetles While most of the information was rather scarce and focused on sightings made in Thailand, other information speculated on this beetle's relationship with the Scarab beetle.

While I would leave all the speculation to the experts, I will nevertheless gloat about how I used a 40mm prime lens to capture these exotic beetles, that too without a tripod. The Canon pancake 40 mm STM lens does not have image stabilization and so taking macro shots becomes a task indeed. Fortunately for me, the prime lens I used for these snaps is a fast enough f-2.8 lens allowing me to take hand-held snaps with a fast enough shutter speed!

I mostly shoot in the RAW format but this time I shot JPEGs as I was not very sure I needed high resolution shots. Incidentally I used an older camera, a Canon 1300D for these snaps. The results when they came out happened to be better than expected. These snaps were taking in morning in my front yard which has abundant greenery for insects to thrive on. It was indeed a change from having to photograph birds in flight, having stuff to photograph without having to travel to the nearest wetland.

Somehow, it makes me wonder why there is so little data about this particular beetle, especially as I have noticed an abundant number of these beetles in Gurugram, the city where I live. I have reason to believe that the Protaetia Alboguttata Beetles are commonly found all over India, especially the North.

A dorsal view of the beetle photographed by me suggests that the beetle in the above photographs is the Proataetia albogutata beetle. It was a challenge to take a dorsal photograph of the beetle as it was constantly on the move.