Southern masked chafer
Cyclocephala lurida
The southern masked chafer is a brown beetle with a black head, like it is wearing a mask. Grown-up beetles do no harm. Its fat white grubs live underground and eat grass roots.
Lives in
The southeastern and midwestern United States, in lawns and grassland
Length
1 to 1.4 cm (0.39 to 0.55 in)
Can it hurt you?
Harmless
Harmless to people. Its grubs can kill lawns in dry weather.
What does it eat?
The grubs eat the roots of grasses and other plants. Grown-up beetles do not cause harm.
How big is it?
How long is it?
🍚as long as 2.5 grains of rice in a row🍽️could run across a dinner table in 7.5 seconds
How big is Southern masked chafer compared to YOU?
Just maths in your browser. Nothing is saved or sent anywhere.
How fast is it?
A garden snail about 0.05 km/h (0.03 mph)
A tortoise about 0.3 km/h (0.19 mph)
Southern masked chafer about 0.48 km/h (0.3 mph)
A person walking about 5 km/h (3.1 mph)
cool stuff
Fun facts
1
The beetles come out of the soil just after sunset in June and July.
2
Males zigzag low over the ground looking for females.
3
Its grubs grow to about 2.5 centimetres long.
4
Raccoons and skunks dig up lawns to eat the grubs.
5
Thief ants help gardeners by eating its eggs and grubs.
you asked
Most asked questions about Southern masked chafer
?Is the southern masked chafer harmful?
The beetles are harmless, but the grubs eat grass roots and can kill lawns.
?How big is the southern masked chafer?
About 1 to 1.4 centimetres long.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Cyclocephala lurida
- Group
- Beetles
- Family
- Scarabaeidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Coleoptera > Scarabaeidae
- Lives on
- North America
Where the facts come from
- Cyclocephala lurida (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by Annika Lindqvist on iNaturalist; https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?user_id=annikaml. CC BY 4.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
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