This absolutely beautiful beetle is a member of a species which does not have a common English name but whose scientific name is Chelorrhina polyphemus confluens, and is a species native to the dense rainforests of central Africa.  It is a member of the family of scarab beetles known as flower beetles due to their fondness for flower nectar, although they will also feed on sap from wounded trees as well as soft fruits such as bananas.

As you can see, the colours and pattern of this beetle are exceptionally bright and distinctive, and he is definitely one of the more attractive beetles which I have reared to adulthood!

Possibly the MOST amazing thing about this beetle, quite apart from its beautiful colours and pattern, is that only three months ago it was not a beetle at all but was a larva or grub.  Beetles go through a complete metamorphosis during their life cycle, just like butterflies and moths, and a grub is the first stage of life of all beetles once they have hatched from their eggs.  The picture below shows how this beetle looked back in the late summertime, and as you can see it was QUITE different and not nearly as attractive as it is now!!! 

When a beetle grub has grown large enough to change into a beetle it makes for itself a pupal cell, which is basically an oval shaped cocoon made out of bits of wood and rotten leaves cemented together by secretions from the grub.  The picture below shows the kind of pupal cell which this beetle would normally make. 

On this occasion however, the grub actually built its pupal cell against the side of the big plastic tub in which it had been living!  This is quite common in these types of beetles, and it meant that I was able to watch the grub building the cell which was fascinating.  Here he is moving about doing exactly that!

This is the grub in its final resting position within the completed pupal cell, with his head facing to the right and his back end to the left. 

I had very much hoped to be able to take a sequence of photographs showing how the body structure changed from grub to beetle during the process but for some reason I wasn't ever able to get any clear photographs after this first day, something I am very disappointed about.  However something about which I am definitely not disappointed is how beautiful the beetle turned out to be, in fact I could not be happier about this and I hope you can see why!