South African beetle found in Norwich woman’s bunch of flowers

Flower Trower and Chris Holmes with the bouquet from South Africa which played host to a green protea beetle.Photo: Bill Smith (Image: Archant)

When her partner, Chris Holmes, presented her an anniversary gift including some colourful protea blooms, it apparently included a rare South African beetle – the first to be spotted in Britain since 1999.

Protea flowers which were in the bouquet from South Africa which played host to a green protea beetle.Photo: Bill Smith (Image: Archant)

They saw their cat, Tilly, paying close attention to a giant beetle on the kitchen floor of their north city home in Eade Road, between Aylsham Road and Angel Road.

'The cat was looking a bit freaked out and I thought she had got a mouse or a frog or something but there was a giant beetle sitting there,' said Flower Trower, who added: 'She didn't damage it, she's not that brave.'

'I'd never seen anything like it before, so we tried to find out more about it,' said Ms Trower, aged 33, who managed to get some photographs of the insect.

'Lo and behold, Chris bought me a bunch of flowers at the weekend. I love flowers and I really get a lot of pleasure from them.

'They're an unusual bunch and have got protea flowers which I hadn't seen before. We suspect that it had come in on one of the flowers.'

However, when she picked it up for closer inspection last Sunday, the beetle, which is about two inches long, flew off. 'I'd assumed it was some native species. I'm not really an outdoorsy girl and I just assumed that it was some strange beetle that I'd not come across before,' she said.

When they asked friends and family for help to identify it, they realised that it probably originated from South Africa's Cape region, where it feeds on the native protea flowers. 'It was quite a surprise,' she added.

She and her partner, who together have three children, are planning to get married in October.

Dr Tony Irwin, who is senior curator of natural history with Norfolk Museums and Archaeology Service at the Shirehall, said that it was a green protea beetle, Trichostetha fascicularis.

'There have been records of accidentally importing live specimens to Europe with cut protea flowers, and I suppose that this is how this specimen arrived,' he said.

'The beetles can fly quite well, so if it was to emerge in a florist's shop, and flew out the door, it could easily end up miles away. It is suspected that the larvae of the beetle may be a pest.'

If found, he suggested that it should be reported to Defra's body, which monitors alien arrivals, the Food and Environment Research Agency, based at York. The last occasion this species was intercepted in Britain was 1999, he added.