The Noble Chafer is a beautiful iridescent beetle & star of our exhibition #MMBeautyandtheBeasts which invites you to encounter beauty in #minibeasts and fall in love with insects.

Continuing our daily thread of awe & wonder from our collection of over 4.5 million objects…

#MMBeautyandtheBeasts brings together hundreds of insects & the work of scientists & artists to explore their curiosity & care for these extraordinary creatures. Check out the exhibition on our mobile site #MMinQuarantine with multilingual interpretation.

https://mmbeautyandthebeasts.wixsite.com/mmbeautyandthebeasts

The Noble Chafer can be found on flower heads of plants like hogweed & the larvae live and feed on the rotting wood of old trees. However, it is an endangered species of British fauna.

Today, some 3,000 insects are known to be vulnerable, endangered or at risk of extinction.

This image of the Noble Chafer was part of Martin Wilson’s Red List Insects exhibition @McrMuseum last year, with macro photos of endangered & extinct insects 15 times their original size!

https://www.museum.manchester.ac.uk/whats-on/exhibitions/currentexhibitions/redlistinsects/

#MMinQuarantine #MMEncyclopedia

Through #MMBeautyandtheBeasts we hope to raise awareness of the UK endangered species of insects featured in the IUCN Red List and to aid conservation by providing the public with visual tools to identify these species.
Find out how to make a difference:
https://www.iucnredlist.org/ 

As its springtime #minibeasts are out and about. Explore in your garden and see which creatures you can find. Take a photograph or draw a picture, we'd love to see

#MMinQuarantine #MMEncyclopedia