On Monday evening we held a very successful Late Night Opening and the undoubted highlight for many people was the as we were just finishing up for the night when I encountered a Greater Stag Beetle careening around the building at head height!
I leapt like a pouncing Serval and plucked it from the air much to everybody’s amusement as they had not seen what I had but the grand reveal was worth the laughs.
It was not the biggest male Stag Beetle but it got a wave of appreciative ooohs and aaahs and spent the next twenty minutes posing on my hand for the visitors before being placed on an appropriate piece of wood in the Wildlife Garden to pose for more aesthetically pleasing images...
Greater... - Tom Bell
Greater... HTV
Absolutely... HTV
Unfortunately Jerry Hoare had not long left us for the evening and missed the opportunity to see both British Stag Beetle species on site in the same day as he had earlier had a great encounter with a no less impressive male of the Lesser species with some ensuing superb macro images.
Lesser... Jerry Hoare
Howard Vaughan, Information Officer
Lovely.Love a stag beetle, me.