June bugs

[Alice Faber]

Jessie Emerson said:
>My office mates and I have a running argument about what is and is not a
>June bug.  The native southerners know that the June bug is irridescent
>green.  The "imports" say that the June bug is brown (what I always called a
>May beetle), and that the green bug is a Japanese beetle.  Neither of these
>is a mayfly, which is spindly with gangly legs and transparent wings.

Well, the bugs that I learned to call June bugs when I lived in Texas were
absolutely not the same kind of bug that was called a Japanese beetle in
the NY suburbs when I was growing up. The latter were indeed irridescent
green. The June bugs were much bigger and made a lot of noise when they
intersected with screens.
--
Alice Faber                                       tel. (203) 865-6163
Haskins Laboratories                              fax  (203) 865-8963
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