However, adults can be distinguished by their sturdy bodies, reddish-brown hue with an iridescent shine, concealed labrum, antenna with 10 segments, flat rear tibia featuring apical spurs separated by tarsal articulations, and elongated male genitalia with sizable, movable apical hooks.

By 1933, M. formosae was recorded within 10 states and 1 district consisting of Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Virginia, and Washington, D.C.

It then spread southward and westward, leading to it being found by 2009 in at least 11 additional states, including Alabama, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Michigan, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Vermont, and West Virginia with possible identification in Kansas and Missouri.

Adults prefer eating flowers like asters, chrysanthemums, dahlias, goldenrods, roses, strawflowers, sunflowers, and zinnias.

[3] Grubs act as pests for various ornamentals, turfs, and gardens along with field crops, such as sweet potatoes, soybeans, and corn.

[1] Maladera formosae undergoes a similar life cycle to other white grub pests like Japanese beetles and masked chafers.

[4] It undergoes a complete metamorphosis with one generation each year, though the exact timing of its life stages depends on temperature and humidity.

Research has, however, suggested that multiple generations can be produced each year, granted a sufficiently warm and moist environment is provided.

Instead, sex determination for M. formosae can be quickly performed under a dissecting microscope or hand lens by assessing posterior abdominal sternite and pygidium orientation.

[9] Maladera formosae has become a problem for crop fields found throughout Ohio, Michigan, and Indiana, for which it has been reported as being even more damaging than other white grub species.

[4] Various root diseases and root-feeding insects have been found to harm perennial strawberry cultivation within the northeastern United States.

Alongside Anomala orientalis, M. formosae has been identified as being amongst the most common white grub pests of Connecticut strawberry fields.

The Food Quality Protection Act of 1996 has also enacted restrictions that ban many carbamate and organophosphate insecticides traditionally used for white grub control.

Researchers believe this conflict in effectiveness of insecticides leads to overtreatment and mistreatment of agricultural fields with minimal or nonexistent M. formosae presence.

This has the potential to create negative implications, such as expensive financial losses, increased resistance development, and unintended environmental consequences.

[9] Though grubs typically cause the most damage by feeding on plant roots, M. formosae adults are still an agricultural concern as they can defoliate several rows of field crops every night and their dispersal determines the location of future larval populations.

However, their efficacy for M. formosae is still being studied as the beetle has been shown to be less susceptible to common nematode strains, such as Heterohabditis bacteriophora and Steinernema glaseri, when compared to other white grub species.

Another isolated strain, Steinernema scarabaei, has as identified in research studies as a possible alternative to pesticides for M. formosae given its high pathogenicity for M.