It's 1981.

1st It's 1981. 2 entomologists working in Western Australia come upon a couple of flying jewel beetles

hovering a few feet above the ground.

They look sort of like giant cockroaches, golden brown with an iridescent sheen.

As they watch the beetles dive down towards the ground.

The two men know the jewel beetles are on the verge of extinction, but they don't know why.

Nobody really does.

The scientists are standing next to a road, and the ground is littered with beer bottles. It's a big pastime out in the

Australian bush. People drink in their cars and chuck the empties out the

window. They call the bottles stubies. The researchers look again at the beetles.

Each is now gripping a stubby with its legs.

Their genitals are exposed, a sign that they're trying to mate.

There's a dead beetle a few inches away covered in ants.

It doesn't take long for the scientists to come up with a hypothesis.

To test it, they place four stubby on the ground and weight.

Pretty soon, the bottles have attracted more male beetles.

They take notes as the beetles drop onto the bottles

and try to copulate with them.

Tirelessly, incessantly, one of them and picks up a bottle and shakes it but the beetle hangs on.

Needless to say it's not getting anywhere with its amorous advances.

The dead beetle nearby looks like he died trying.

So why don't the beetles give up?

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